Issues in Dance Reconstruction:Karaṇasas Dance Texts in a Cross-cultural Context

Abstract

TheNāṭyaśāstrais a Sanskrit work on drama, dance, and music of uncertain date, which has acquired the status ofUr-text of Indian classical dance. It was in the twentieth century, through the modernization process of bharatanatyam, that theNāṭyaśāstraand its related texts came to be regarded as setting out the grammar of Indian dance classicism (Coorlawala 1994; Meduri 1996; O'Shea 2001). Chapter 4 of theNāṭyaśāstradeals specifically with dance, here distinct from acting, and describes the 108 dance units—Karaṇas—of thetāṇḍavadance of Śiva and their combinations, dance phrases namedaṇgahāras(NS 1988–89, 4, w. 1–245). This particular chapter of theNāṭyaśāstrahas attracted attention ever since Naidu, Naidu, and Pantulu published its translation into English,Tānḍavalakṇaṣam, in 1936. Since then there have been other translations of theNāṭyaśāstra, among which the two volumes by Manmohan Ghosh, in 1951 and 1956 respectively, and different interpretations of theKaraṇasof chapter 4. Readings have drawn on the iconography of theKaraṇasas found at the temples at Thanjavur, Kumbakonam, and Chidambaram in southern India. Thekaranareliefs on the walls of Kumbakonam and Chidambaram have been identified by inscriptions found on eachkaraṇaslab, that give the Sanskrit name of thekaraṇaas recorded in theNāṭyaśāstra.

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