I thought pOtana committed a similar (perhaps more serious) faux pas,
in agnidyOtana's description of rukmiNi, to SrI kRshNa.
But I have another, perhaps lighter (or perhaps stronger) kind of
anoucityamu. I am not sure if it can be called by that word. It is more
of the sort of thing that a "continuity" person is supposed to take
care of when they are shooting films. The kind we notice when the
hero comes down the stairs, wearing a kurta at the top of the stairs, and
a regular shirt down the stairs. They are supposed to take care of
things such as these by keeping elaborate notes, and maintaining the
"continuity" between the scenes, which are shot in quite a random
order, or so I understand.
We have many episodes in our mythology. Various events happen in the
"lives" of these gods, semi-gods, and demi-gods (and the corresponding
goddesses). Is the chronology of these kept in mind very carefully, when
using epithets for them? For example, if daksha is putting down his
son-in-law, can he accuse him being garaLa-kanTha? Depends on whether
"ksheera sAgara mathanam" happened before daksha yaj~namu (somebody,
correct the wRITing of that word) or not. Of course I saw ksheera
sAgara mathanam before I saw hara vilAsam (refer to the 1994 North
American Tour ofthe Kuchipudi Art Academy, Cleveland-Sep6-KSM,
Detroit-Sep7-HV).
Is "sarwa mangaLa" another name for sati/dAkshAyaNi, or pArvati?
Because, in the ksheera sAgara mathana incident (in the book, not the
play), pOtana says,
mringeDu vADu vibhunDani
mringeDidi garaLamaniyunu, mElani prajakun
mringumane sarwamangaLa
mangaLa sUtrampu ...........
In the daksha yaj~na episode, there is a poem by dAkshAyaNi, just
before the self-immolation.
neelagaLAparAdhi yagu neeku tanUbhava nouTa jAladA?
cAlu kumartya! needu ....(1)..... madi siggu puTTeDin,
Ela dharan mahAtmulaku yeggonarinceDi pApa karmamul
......... talampa, janakA, kuTilAtmaja, yenci cUDagan
I wrote this from memory. Apart from the gaps shown, there may be
(no, make that, there would be) some other errors.
Of the many poems from bhAgabvatam that I have memorized, this for
some reason sounded pale to me. I think the word in (1) repeats
the fact that she is his daughter. The "crutch-words", "Ela dharan",
"yenci cUDagan", are clearly (a bit of a long reach for me, I confess)
filler words.
Are these legitimate complaints, or mere "randhrAnvEshaNa", in a
monumentsl book, in which in my obviously less than perfect perception,
I see some snags?
Ramakrishna