Kālidāsa’s nāṭakas, namely the Abhijñānaśākuntala and the Vikramorvaśīya are undisputedly among the greatest works of Sanskrit literature. Thus it is not surprising that there have already been many excellent literary interpretations focusing on these works. My aim is not to augment this list, but instead I intend to shed some light on the less-investigated political message of these dramas. In other words, I am attempting to re-read Kālidāsa’s plays as pieces of political theatre.
Abhijñānaśākuntala = Onians, Isabelle and Somadeva Vasudeva (eds.) 2006. The Recognition of Shakúntala by Kālidāsa. [Clay Sanskrit Library] New York: New York University Press & JJC Foundation.
CII Vol. 3. = Fleet, John Faithfull (ed.) 1888. Corpus Inscriptionum Indicarum. Vol. III. Inscriptions of the Early Gupta Kings and their Successors. Calcutta: Archaeological Survey of India.
Harivaṃśa = Vaidya, Parashuram Lakshman (ed.) 1969. The Harviaṃśa. Being the Khila or Supplement to the Mahābhārata. Poona: Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute.
Kāṭayavema comm. ad Abhijñānaśākuntala = Kāḷe, Gaṇeś Kāśināth (ed.) 1973. Mumbai: Kalyāṇa.
Mahābhārata = Sukthankar, Vishnu S. et al. (eds.) 1927–1966. The Mahābhārata. Poona: Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute.
Mālavikāgnimitra = Onians, Isabelle (ed.) 2009. Mālavikā and Agnimitra by Kālidāsa. New York: New York University Press & JJC Foundation.
Matsya-purāṇa = 1954: Calcutta, Caukhamba Vidyabhavan (http://gretil.sub.uni-goettingen.de/gretil/corpustei/transformations/html/sa_matsyapurANa1-176.htm [accessed on: 3.8.2021.]).
Padma-purāṇa = Pratap, Surendra (ed.) 1984. The Padmamahāpurāṇam. Delhi: Nag Publishers.
Raghuvaṃśa = Nandargikar, Gopal Raghunath (ed.) 1971. The Raghuvaṃśa of Kālidāsa with the Commentary of Mallinātha. Delhi, Patna, Varanasi: Motilal Banarsidass.
Rāmāyaṇa = Bhatt, G. H. et al. (eds.) 1960–1975. The Vālmīki-Rāmāyaṇa. Baroda: Oriental Institute.
Ṛgveda = Van Nooten, Barend – Holland, Gary (eds.) 1995. Rig Veda: A Metrically Restored Text With an Introduction and Notes. Cambridge (Massachusetts): Harvard University Department of Sanskrit and Indian Studies.
Vikramorvaśīya = Onians, Isabelle (ed.) 2009. How Úrvashi Was Won by Kālidāsa. [Clay Sanskrit Library] New York: New York – JJC Foundation.
Agrawal, Ashvini 1989. Rise and Fall of the Imperial Guptas. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass.
Arendt, Hannah 1998. The Human Condition. Chicago: The University of Chicago.
Bakker, Hans T. 2006. ‘A Theatre of Broken Dreams. Vidiśā in the Days of Gupta Hegemony.’ In: Martin Brandtner and Shishir Kumar Panda (eds.) Interrogating History. Essays for Hermann Kulke. New Delhi: Manohar, 165–187.
Balogh, Dániel and Eszter Somogyi (trans.) 2009. Mālavikā and Agnimitra by Kālidāsa. [Clay Sanskrit Library] New York: New York University Press & JJC Foundation.
Basham, Arthur Llewellyn 1955. ‘The Date of the End of the Reign of Kumāra Gupta I and the Succession After his Death.’ Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies 17/2: 366–369.
Bhatia, O. P. Singh 1962. The Imperial Guptas. New Delhi: Surjeet Book Depot.
Brinkhaus, Horst 1992. ‘Early Developmental Stages of the Viṣṇuprādurbhāva Lists.’ Wiener Zeitschrift für die Kunde Südasiens.Supplement Proceedings of the VIIIth World Sanskrit Conference Vienna 1990. 36: 101–110.
Brockington, John 1998. The Sanskrit Epics. Leiden, Boston, and Köln: Brill.
Brodbeck, Simon 2011. ‘The Rejection of Śakuntalā in the Mahābhārata. Dynastic Considerations.’ In: Saswati Sengupta and Deepika Tandon (eds.) Revisiting Abhijñānaśākuntalam: Love, Lineage and Language in Kālidāsa’s Nāṭaka. New Delhi: Orient Blackswan, 219–237.
Dezső, Csaba 2014: ‘We do not fully understand the learned poet’s intention in not composing a twentieth canto: Addiction as a Structuring Theme in the Raghuvaṃśa.’ South Asian Studies 30/2: 159–172.
Fleet, John Faithfull (trans.) 1888. ‘Texts and Translations.’ In: Id.: Inscriptions of the Early Gupta Kings and their Successors. [Corpus Inscriptionum Indicarum 3.] Calcutta: Superintendent of Government Printing, [II/]1–350.
Foucault, Michel 2007. Security, Territory, Population. Lectures at the Collège de France 1977–1978. [Ed. by Michel Senellart, translated by Graham Burchell.] London: Palgrave Macmillan.
Gawroński, Andrzej 1914–1918. ‘The digvijaya of Raghu and some connected problems.’ Rocznik Orientalistyczny 1: 43–82.
Gerow, Edwin 1979. ‘Plot Structure and the Development of Rasa in the Śakuntalā. Pt. I.’ Journal of the American Oriental Society 99/4: 559–572.
Hartmann, Jens-Uwe 2004. ‘»Himmel und Erde mit einem Namen begreifen«. Das indische Drama Shakuntala.’ In: Martin Hose (ed.) Große Texte alter Kulturen. Literarische Reise von Gizeh nach Rom. Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 111–129.
Ingalls, Daniel H. H. 1976. ‘Kālidāsa and the Attitudes of the Golden Age.’ Journal of the American Oriental Society 96/1: 15–26.
Kirby, Michael 1975. ‘On Political Theatre.’ The Drama Review: TDR 19/2: 129–135.
Kulke, Hermann and Dietmar Rothermund 2002. A History of India. London, New York: Taylor & Francis Group.
Lopez, Carlos A. 2015. ‘Philological Limits of Translating Religion. Śraddhā and Dharma in Hindu Texts.’ In: Michael DeJonge and Christiane Tietz (eds.) Translating Religion. What is Lost and Gained? New York: Routledge, 45–69.
Mazumdar, B. C. 1909. ‘The Date of Kālidāsa.’ The Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland 3: 731–739.
Mirashi, Vishnu Vasudev and Narayan Raghunath Navlekar 1969. Kālidāsa. Date, Life and Works. Bombay: Popular Prakashan.
Morgan, Margot 2013. Politics and Theatre in Twentieth-Century Europe. Imagination and Resistance. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
Pathak, Kashinath Bapu (ed.) 1916. Kalidasa’s Meghadūta or The Cloud-Messenger (As embodied in the Pārśvābhyudaya) with The Commentary of Mallinātha, Literal English Translation, Variant Readings, Critical Notes, Appendixes and Introduction, determining the date of Kālidāsa from lates antiquarian researches. Poona: Aryabhushan Press.
Pollock, Sheldon 2006. The Language of the Gods in the World of Men. Sanskrit, Culture, and Power in Premodern India. Berkeley, Los Angeles, and London: University of California Press.
Rao, Velcheru Narayana and David Shulman (trans.) 2009. How Úrvashi Was Won by Kālidāsa. [Clay Sanskrit Library] New York: New York and JJC Foundation.
Tandon, Pankaj 2014. ‘The Succession after Kumāra Gupta I.’ Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society 24/4: 557–572.
Thapar, Romila 2011. Śakuntalā. Texts, Readings, Histories. New York: Columbia University Press.
Thapar, Romila 2013. The Past Before Us: Historical Traditions of Early North India. Cambridge (Mass.) and London: Harvard University Press.
Tieken, Herman 2001. ‘The Place of the Mālavikāgnimitra within Kālidāsa’s oeuvre.’ Indo-Iranian Journal 44/2: 149–166.
Vasudeva, Somadeva (ed., trans.) 2006. The Recognition of Shakúntala by Kālidāsa. [Clay Sanskrit Library] New York: New York University Press & JJC Foundation.
Walzer, Michael 1984. ‘Liberalism and the Art of Separation.’ Political Theory 12/3: 315–330.
Willis, Michael 2005. ‘Later Gupta History: Inscriptions, Coins and Historical Ideology.’ Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society 15/2: 131–150.
Willis, Michael 2009. The Archaeology of Hindu Ritual. Temples and the Establishment of the Gods. New York: Cambridge University Press.