पृष्ठम्:विक्रमोर्वशीयम् (कल्पलताव्याख्यासमेतम्).djvu/८९

23

ESTIMATE OF THE PLAY.

ends. Here it is not like a sly commitment by Shakuntala or Dushyanta in the absence of her guardian and hence the union in Vikramorvashi is more stationary and adequate. After the close of the poorva rag or the acquisition of the desired love in Shakuntal, there commences a long, long and disproportionate separation from the third Act to the seventh Act with a final union culminating in comedy. Whereas in Vikramorvashi, after the poorva-rag which is in itself blended happily with interim visits, there is a good deal of Sambhoga and the couple enjoy a pleasant excursion where the poet, to heighten his ruling sentiment, cleverly introduces the scene of Udayavati which gives birth to the womanly jealousy in the heart of Urvashi. The jealousy resulting in her love-bedaubed wrath makes her lose naturally the balance of temper and places her on the borders of the Kumari Grove and turns her into a standing creeper. Thus the poet once again throws the couple into separation, the effects whereof on the royal pair are more appreciable than in Shakuntal, for the Sambhoga in the former is better felt than in the latter. 'In the former, the separation is due to a natural womanly jealousy and the suffering of separation suits the natural justice better in this case, for the hero suffers here for the breach of love in peeping at Udayavati and the heroine out of her keen sense of wrathful jealousy: whereas in Shakuntal, the heroine is a victim of a brutal wrath of a visitor saint all her life and the hero is left to enjoy right royally the pleasures of his over-crowded seraglio to a greater length of separation, viz. till the revival of his memory of his past action so late as in the sixth Act. Unlike this, the hero and the heroine both fall into separation in Vikramoryashi; the heroine wholly becoming senseless on account of her transformation into a plant and the hero no less senseless in the stage of unmad. That is to say, the sentiment develops here upto the nine stages of cupid, whereas in Shākuntal heroine alone suffers. This union here is, again not the final beatitude as is in the case of Shakuntal; for the .couple once again unites and returns home with glee after a long excursion and enjoys ones again the pleasure of union for a certain length. This union, is again overshadowed with a gloomy prospect of separation at the sight of their son . Ayush because it means that the period of co-habitation had come to an end. There is a short vipralambha again.culminating: finally into a life-