Page 9 - GALIET LOVE, FATE AND REMORSE: Sakuntala IV

SAKUNTALA: THELABIRYNTHOF LOVE, FATE AND REMORSE
the Chariot, the Ring, the Fish and Indra’s Ford.
“Remorse, the fatal egg by pleasure laid” Cowper, William (The Progress of Error, l. 239)
cover with scenes from Kalidasa's play, Shakuntala, 12th century, Nepal
Ink and color on wood; 2 x 7 15/16 in. (5.1 x 20.2 cm)
Lent by The Kronos Collections (L.1985.42.28)2
A spectacle. Act Six of Kalidasa’s immortal Sakuntala3 has sprung as my preferred act in the play. First, more than any other act, it distils the perennial tensions, perils and consequences of King Dushyanta’s actions under the ill-fated spell of delusion4 and self- doubt cast by Durvasas. King Dushyanta’s dharmic and karmic predicament whether “to reject his own wife or defile himself by touching the wife of another” (V,31) annunciates freezing: the entering into the
2http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/nepp/hob_L.1985.42.28.html 3 Kalidasa. Shakuntala. Trans. C.H. Tawney. Calcutta: Thacker, Spink and Co. 1875.
4 Though rational action also has its perils.
dark and cold labyrinth of no feasible escape. Second, Act Six becomes the recognition or anagnorisis within the play. King Dushyanta becomes aware of his blindness and folly 3⁄4 the rejection of his beloved and pregnant Sakuntala 3⁄4 by merely fixing his gaze at his recovered ring from the carp’s belly at Indra’s Ford. King Dushyanta’s late recognition is riddled with piercing torment, excruciating remorse and self-blame only to be redeemed upon learning of the curse. In a way, King Dushyanta’s delusion is a copy of the torment inflicted on some of the mythological kings and heroes of Archaic Greece by feared ate5. Third, unlike any other act, Act Six heightens suspense and it arouses pity and fear by increasing the plasma of the King’s suffering and remorse. Indeed, the outcome of the play becomes suspenseful and uncertain since every act jumps from surprise to surprise 3⁄4 from curse to marriage to pregnancy to rejection to remorse. In the end, Act VI heightens the audience’s empathy given the tragic turn of fate. Similarly, it seems natural to commiserate with King Dushyanta’s tragic
5 Ate is the personification of madness, delusion or folly. Agamemnon declares he suffered ate when he took Briseis from Achilles which brought forth Achilles’ wrath and his subsequent withdrawal from fighting in the Trojan War. Homer. The Iliad. Trans. Robert Fagles. New York: Penguin Group, 1990.
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