Alternative Krishnas: Regional and Vernacular Variations on a Hindu Deity

10. Epiphany in Radha’s Arbor Nature and the Reform of Bhakti in Hariaudh’s Priyapravas

Chapter 10
Epiphany in Radha’s Arbor Nature and the Reform of Bhakti in Hariaudh’s Priyapravas VALERIE RITTER In 1914, Ayodhyasimh Upadhyay ’Hariaudh,’ a tax officer in a district near Varanasi, and well-known Braj Bhasha poet, published an epiclength poem entitled Priyapravas (The Sojourn of the Beloved). It was named for the episode in Krishna’s biography when he left his home in Vrindavana for Mathura at the evil king Kamsa’s invitation, and resides there while the residents of Braj long for his return and worry about his welfare. Priyapravas, a harbinger of some characteristics of later modern Hindi literature, quickly became part of the modern Hindi literary canon, and remains part of the syllabi of many Hindi literature courses in India. The work was conceived as a mahakavya in modern Hindi, and toward this purpose, it was written in Sanskrit meters, and its contents were clearly inspired by the long poetic works of classical Sanskrit poet Kalidasa, and based upon the deeds of Krishna as put forth in the Bhagavata Purana. At the same time, the subject matter evoked Braj Bhasha bhakti and rŒti (or courtly) poetry on Krishna and Radha.1 In matters of language, Hariaudh subscribed to the agenda of the Hindi movement of the late nineteenth century, which promoted the use of the NagarŒ script, and sought to reidentify the Hindustani lingua franca with Sanskrit, to the exclusion of the other basic strain of its linguistic heritage, Urdu.2 This agenda was carried out in a political atmosphere of Hindu-Muslim tension, and a 177 178 Valerie Ritter nationalist movement that increasingly defined itself as Hindu. Braj Bhasha, a literary dialect of Hindi used pan-regionally in devotional and courtly poetry, had come into disfavor as a literary medium, due to its distance from common speech, KharŒ BolŒ, and its association with erotic poetry concerning the love relationship between the nayaka and nayika, hero and heroine of the srzgara rasa, who had become identified with Krishna and Radha. The problem posed for the colonial intelligentsia by the eroticism in the Krishna-bhakti tradition has been well documented. Braj Bhasha was accused of being unmasculine, and the erotic topics of Krishnaite bhakti and courtly literature deemed improper.3 Decades earlier, a sex scandal plagued the Vallabha sect, leading to the Maharaj Libel Case, which inspired much defensiveness among Vaishnava Hindus confronted with Victorian British legal circumspection of theology concerning Krishna’s physical love with gopŒs.4 In 1886 the famous Bengali novelist Bankimcandra Chattopadhyay wrote a treatise in defense of the “heroic” Krishna, rejecting the god’s sexual exploits as “medieval accretions.”5 The bourgeois bhadralok in Bengal rejected certain forms of popular culture considered to present unseemly sexual portrayals of Krishna myth.6 Likewise, the idioms and images of romantic love that infused the Radha-Krishna myth were rejected by many early modern Hindi authors in the construction of “modern literature.” In short, it was a period of identity crisis for those who were steeped in previous literary and religious traditions of Braj poetry and Krishna bhakti, but who also wanted to create a “modern” Hindi literature, comparable to that of nineteenth-century England or Bengal. Hariaudh and his Priyapravas arose out of the hotbed of Hindi literary canon formation, as Hindi literature was becoming an industry, due to new textbook demands and writers with missionary intentions to promote a Sanskritized Hindi style. However, the Hindi movement’s task was not only to produce the modern literary canon, but also to edit and represent a canon of early Hindi poetry, much of it bhakti poetry, through a modern lens, and with a particularly Hindu slant. Hariaudh was one of the editors for the NagarŒ PracarinŒ Sabha’s Sur Sagar, and as such was at the center of this larger project to create a standardized textual canon for Hindi.7 Hariaudh considered himself a rasik, a connoisseur of the traditional poetic arts, and he was not particularly invested in English-language literature, having studied English for only six months as a youth. He also identified himself as both Hindu and Sikh, and his persona as a poet later became linked somewhat with his Sikh apparel and santlike social reformism. Priyapravas was first published in 1914 by the well-known Khadgavilas Press in Patna,8 and later in VaranasŒ.9 The text was revised at least twice, and the latter revision...