163. DHVANYĀLOKA 161

DHVANYĀLOKA 161

15 The ध्वन्यालोक. The work has been published in the KM series with the commentary, called लोचन, of अभिनवगुप्त, on the first three saalas. Dr. S. K. De edited the commentary of अभिनवगुप्त on the 4th उद्योत from some mss, in the Journal of the Dept. of Letters, Calcutta University, vol. IX. pp. 15-42. Kashi S. S. [also called Haridas Sanskrit Granthamālā] published the whole of the Dhvanyaloka with Locana on all the four Uddyotas and a modern commentary called Balapriya. This was published in 1940. The ea ana is an epoch- making work in the history of Alankara Literature. It occupies the same position in the Alankārasāstra as Pāņinī's sūtras in grammar and the Vedantasutras in Vedanta. The work shows great erudition and critical insight. It is written in a lucid and forcible style and bears the stamp of originality on every page. As the रसगङ्गाधर remarks (p. 425 ध्वनिकृतामालक्कारिकस- रषिव्यवस्थापकत्वात्), the ध्वन्यालोक settled the principles to be followed in Poetics. The ea ais is divided into three parts : first come the arfrars, which are 129 in the K. M. (first) edition, then comes the afa in prose explaining (often at great length) the kārikās, and the examples, most of which are taken from previous poets. The work is divided into four sgatas. The first verse is a शाद लविकीडित, the 13th is an Arya, the 4th and 6th Upajatis, and in the 3rd उद्द्योत there are four आर्याs, while all the other kārikas in the first three uddyotas are in the śloka metre; but in the 4th which contains only 17 arfrars, the last three verses are in the रसोद्ता, मालिनी and शिखरिंणी metres. All Sanskrit scholars owe a deep debt of gratitude to the Kāvyamālā series of the Nirnaya-sagar Press in Bombay for issuing hundreds of beautifully printed and cheap editions of Sanskrit works. The Dhvanyaloka with Locana was printed in that series for the first time over sixty years ago based on three mss. only. The text of the Dhvanyaloka and of the Locana as then printed was rather defective. And the same text has been reprinted by the Press in several editions [except omitting some verses as Karikas]. Now many new mss. have become available. At the Bhandarkar Institute alone I found five mss. in Devanagari characters and two in Sāradā script. An edition based on these and other mss. available in the whole of India is a great desideratum. The