Sakuntala: Texts, Readings, Histories

The importance of Sakuntala as personifying Indian womanhood in Indian literature and culture is undisputed. This book attempts to explore some of the links between culture, history and gender, and between literature and history, through reading variant versions of the narrative of Sakuntala. These include the stories in the Mahabharata, the play by Kalidasa, and the 18th-century katha in Braj. The transformation of Sakuntala from an autonomous assertive figure in the Mahabharata to the quintessential submissive woman in the Kalidasa version is carefully examined by the author through a fascinating reading of the texts and translations of the play in India and Europe.