Ananda Coomaraswamy by G.B. Harish
Ankita Pustaka, Rs. 150
Dr. G. B. Harish is a rare scholar. Besides holding a doctoral degree in Kannada, he is well-versed in Sanskrit, Pali and English; and his expertise ranges from Kannada literature to Buddhist and Tantric literatures. His 15 published works include literary criticism, biographies, and introductions to Dhammapada and Tantrashastra. The present work on Ananda Coomaraswamy is another such challenging work in Kannada.
Introducing and explicating Coomaraswamy who wrote about different is a demanding task. In order to bring coherence and a sort of continuity, after introducing the man and his works in the first two chapters, Harish discusses a few major works of Coomaraswamy chronologically – the works written in the Sri Lankan period, the Indian period and the Boston period. In the sixth chapter, Harish brings in brief but interesting comparisons between Coomaraswamy and a few great Western intellectuals such as William Blake, Frederick Nietzsche, Rene Guenon and I.A. Richards. In this brief review, I mainly focus on his work on Hindu religion and Art.
Some of the principal views of Ananda Coomaraswamy, particularly in The Dance of Shiva are the following: Coomaraswamy stands for ‘universalism’; but he clarifies that it is not the ‘uniformity of uniforms.’ He wants all to recognise and accept differences in different belief-systems and ways of life. To him, there ought to be differences but not opposition. He views the universal and the particular as two different and complementary facets of Truth. Secondly, Coomaraswamy does not endorse the theory of ‘Nationalism,’ the dominant ideology of the late 19 and early 20 centuries. He argues that neither a single race nor a single language makes a nation; the two essential features of a Nation are ‘geographical oneness’ and a common historical development or culture, which India can boast of. To him, ‘tradition’ is neither of the past nor outdated: tradition “represents what is timeless, stable and correct.” India’s contribution to human welfare, he says, is “a constant intuition of the unity of all life.”
Coming to Art Criticism, Coomaraswamy traces four stages in the Hindu view of Art: a) Vedic-aesthetic (appreciation of skill), b) Upanishadic (no explicit aesthetic), c) Pali Buddhism and the Sutras-Shastra literature (hedonistic; hence art is discouraged), and d) Art as Yoga (subject-object difference erased). Bhakti and Yoga motifs, he says, have given Indian Art “tender humanism and profound Nature sympathy.” The root idea behind all dances, Coomaraswamy points out, is the manifestation of primal rhythmic energy; and Siva’s dance is the clearest image of the activity of God. Such a cosmic activity is the central motif of the Nataraja dance, which is a “symbolic synthesis of Science, Religion and Art.”
Unless one considers Ananda Coomaraswamy’s views in the colonial context which forced every Indian intellectual to emphatically assert the rich heritage of Indian art and culture, there is the danger of dismissing him as a right wing Hindu ideologue. For, he argues that “natural hierarchy is the basis of caste-system”, justifies the Purdah system of Hindu women in the north, and upholds the Indian religious marriages as against ‘love marriages of the West.’ He even goes to the extent of defending the indefensible Sati custom, citing instances of the Sati s of ancient Tamil poetry, Harsha’s mother, and the Sati’s noble love for her husband as sung by the poet Mohammad Rizaa during Akbar’s reign. ( DOS, p.127-129)
G. B. Harish deserves the thanks of all Kannada readers for introducing a great, but complex thinker, Ananda Coomaraswamy.
