The Little Clay Cart | Page 5

social position which makes such constancy
difficult. Yet she cannot be called a great character; she does not seem
so true to life as her clever maid, Madanika. In making the heroine of
his play a courtezan, Shudraka follows a suggestion of the technical
works on the drama; he does not thereby cast any imputation of ill on
Vasantasena's character. The courtezan class in India corresponded
roughly to the hetæræ of ancient Greece or the geishas of Japan; it was
possible to be a courtezan and retain one's self-respect. Yet the
inherited[22] way of life proves distasteful to Vasantasena; her one
desire is to escape its limitations and its dangers by becoming a legal
wife.[23]
In Maitreya, the Vidushaka, we find an instance of our author's
masterly skill in giving life to the dry bones of a rhetorical definition.
The Vidushaka is a stock character who has something in common with
a jester; and in Maitreya the essential traits of the character--eagerness
for good food and other creature comforts, and blundering devotion to
his friend--are retained, to be sure, but clarified and elevated by his
quaint humor and his readiness to follow Charudatta even in death. The
grosser traits of the typical Vidushaka are lacking. Maitreya is neither a
glutton nor a fool, but a simple-minded, whole-hearted friend.
The courtier is another character suggested by the technical works, and
transformed by the genius of Shudraka. He is a man not only of
education and social refinement, but also of real nobility of nature. But
he is in a false position from the first, this true gentleman at the
wretched court of King Palaka; at last he finds the courage to break
away, and risks life, and all that makes life attractive, by backing
Aryaka. Of all the conspirators, it is he who runs the greatest risk. To
his protection of Vasantasena is added a touch of infinite pathos when
we remember that he was himself in love with her.[24] Only when
Vasantasena leaves him[25] without a thought, to enter Charudatta's
house, does he realize how much he loves her; then, indeed, he breaks
forth in words of the most passionate jealousy. We need not linger over

the other characters, except to observe that each has his marked
individuality, and that each helps to make vivid this picture of a society
that seems at first so remote.
Shudraka's humor is the third of his vitally distinguishing qualities.
This humor has an American flavor, both in its puns and in its
situations. The plays on words can seldom be adequately reproduced in
translation, but the situations are independent of language. And
Shudraka's humor runs the whole gamut, from grim to farcical, from
satirical to quaint. Its variety and keenness are such that King Shudraka
need not fear a comparison with the greatest of Occidental writers of
comedies.
It remains to say a word about the construction of the play. Obviously,
it is too long. More than this, the main action halts through acts ii. to v.,
and during these episodic acts we almost forget that the main plot
concerns the love of Vasantasena and Charudatta. Indeed, we have in
The Little Clay Cart the material for two plays. The larger part of act i.
forms with acts vi. to x. a consistent and ingenious plot; while the
remainder of act i. might be combined with acts iii. to v. to make a
pleasing comedy of lighter tone. The second act, clever as it is, has
little real connection either with the main plot or with the story of the
gems. The breadth of treatment which is observable in this play is
found in many other specimens of the Sanskrit drama, which has set
itself an ideal different from that of our own drama. The lack of
dramatic unity and consistency is often compensated, indeed, by lyrical
beauty and charms of style; but it suggests the question whether we
might not more justly speak of the Sanskrit plays as dramatic poems
than as dramas. In The Little Clay Cart, at any rate, we could ill afford
to spare a single scene, even though the very richness and variety of the
play remove it from the class of the world's greatest dramas.
II. THE TRANSLATION
The following translation is sufficiently different from previous
translations of Indian plays to require a word of explanation. The
difference consists chiefly in the manner in which I have endeavored to
preserve the form of the original. The Indian plays are written in

mingled prose and verse; and the verse portion forms so large a part of
the whole that the manner in which it is rendered is of much
importance. Now this verse is not analogous to the iambic trimeter of
Sophocles or the blank verse of Shakspere, but roughly