Abstract: This short paper wishes to look at the Indian tradition where a certain degree of interactivity and translatability (and transformability) existed among the various kalas like natya, gana, chitra, vastu, nritya and so on. It wishes to point out that this was possible because of certain structural similarities among the kalas, and because of a common aesthetic goal that each strived to achieve, at least in theory. In that context, it briefly explores the notions of tala (rhythm), dosa (defects) and gunas (percepts) as elements of structure common to different kalas and bhava (aesthetic mood), rasa (aesthetic relish) as the goal of most of the kalas. It also looks at the ragamala tradition both in music and painting to illustrate the above points. The postcoloniality of the exploration lies in the very desire to rethink the convention in terms of the notion of translation. At the end, it whishes to raise questions related to methodology in translating, transcreating or transgressing traditions in a postcolonial context.

       This reflection, in a sense, emerges out of my post-coloniality. I read most Indian texts in English and often reflect in English. While I write in English, I also write with an acute awareness of my delicate balance among many cultures-my English education, methodological training, and my desire to translate everything into everything else. Along with that I carry the burden of my 'otherness' both from my culture(s) and language(s) as well as the culture(s) of the language in which I write. If today, I try to understand translation, transmutation and transformation in the Indian tradition, it is so because of my post-coloniality (where, at least, I am free to talk about my colonial past) and my suppressed desire to show the superiority of my tradition through a language that I use with ambivalence. And through a concept – translation, that is alien to that tradition.

       The Visnudharmottara, in a passage emphasizing the knowledge required to understand image making, says:

    “Lord of men, he who does not know properly the rules of chitra can, by no means, be able to discern the characteristics of image … without a knowledge of the art of dancing, the rules of painting are very difficult to be understood... The practice of dancing is difficult to be understood by one who is not acquainted with music. Without singing music cannot be understood”.

     Talking of 'translation' in a post-colonial context, one always carries an awareness of translation as a mode of mastering the 'other', (language or culture), of understanding it, and thus, of being in control of it. In talking of translation here, I do not wish to bring any of those connotations. Infact, to a traditional mind, the passage above would not look like an attempt at 'translation' leave apart 'cultural translation' or 'translation from one mode to the other.' (However, my very attempt at understanding it from within my historical context is perhaps, an attempt to master this tradition or at least come to terms with it as neither an outsider nor an insider, and thus, some kind of attempt at trans-cultural translation.)

     Yet the above passage is not mere theory, nor a paradigm. It is something practiced even today, at least by practitioners of dance and music (if not of traditional painting and sculpture). Most importantly, there are examples of not only such an understanding, but of practices based on such understandings rather than on realizations.

       However, before I discuss them, I wish to point out that when I talk of 'translation' here, it has to be understood in another tradition, benefit of the connotations of the politics of 'property', 'authenticity', 'faithfulness' or 'ownership' so pervasively associated with the word in its own context. For instance, in talking of translation today, one has to think of the author's consent (if he is alive), permission to translate, which look at the text to be translated as something which belongs to a particular person, involving questions of authority and authenticity. But the context which I am referring to often treats its texts as belonging to a tradition or culture rather than an individual, very often in a tradition of giving up or renouncing, and finally of transcendence. Much of Indian tradition is anonymous, not because methods of documentation did not exist (Which itself points to a lack of need for it, or a socio-cultural structure that inhabited such developments), but because of a socio-cultural precept of renunciation. In an ethos where all kalas can lead one to moksa or transcendence, at a personal level many artists transcended ego and thus renounced their work. On the other hand, in such an ethos, even when traditions were handed down, under social pressure, as well as in a convention that discouraged such documentation, authorships got lost over time. The point I wish to make is that when one mode (say nritya taken from kavya) was incorporated into another, when one source was used in another context, the element of authorship in relation to use was not a sensitive issue. The other point that needs clarification here is how I understand and use 'translation'. I do not use it here in the specific sense of translating a 'text' from one language to another, from one culture to another. By translation, I mean translating from one 'mode' (or call it genre which is more culture specific) to another. It is for this reason that I also use the terms 'transmutation' and 'transformation'. I wish to suggest that there is the possibility of 'translation' from one mode to another, which implies a one to one correspondence of signs in two different modes - say words and gestures, where a specific gesture might have equivalence to a specific word. There is 'transmutation' where a clear cut one to one correspondence of signs does not exist, but structural similarities are evident - for instance, as in case of sentences and note clusters, which are expected to convey similar emotions in specific cultures. There is also 'transformation', where two different modes intend to evoke. The same responds and succeed in doing so by different modes. Most importantly, very often, in the Indian context of kalas, all the processes are simultaneously evident.

        Firstly, there is the possibility of 'translation' from one mode to another, which implies a one to one correspondence of signs in two different modes - say words and gestures, where a specific gesture might have equivalence to a specific word.

       Bashikabhinaya (abhinaya or expression through words) can be effortlessly be 'translated' into angikabhinaya (where gestures convey meaning). Since an elaborate repertoire of gestures exists, 1 one might go to the extent of claiming that a word by body translation is possible here. This is especially true in the context of stylized presentation (natyadharmi), which uses convention and general acceptance like written or spoken language. And this extends (to an extent) also to chitra and vastu where gestures can be represented, though sequence cannot be as systematically depicted as in dance.

abhaya mudra (reassurance)                                       samapada sthanakam asana (steadfastness)

         There is 'transmutation' where a clear-cut correspondence of signs does not exist, but structural similarities are evident - for instance, as in case of sentences and note cultures that are expected to convey similar emotions in specific cultures. While music is not linked directly to the 'translation' of words or gestures, it is intrinsically linked to the core elements of bhava and rasa. Since different notes and clusters are associated with different bhavas and rasas, since fragments of poems are used, as well as dosas, gunas and alankaras, sangeeta (through structural similarities, though not one to one equation) can transmute another mode to evoke a certain mood.

          At the core almost all aesthetic experiences in our tradition lie in bhava and rasa, something that we will discuss briefly below. In order to achieve them through different kalas, the same theme can be either 'shown' in different ways (kavya, nritya, kala) are suggested (as in evoking the essence of a kavya through gana). Most importantly, very often, in the Indian context of kalas, all the processes are simultaneously evident.

         This discussion is relevant in the contemporary context, perhaps because such an underlying unity is not so clearly discernable in the Western context. Hence, translating across modes - inter-semiotic translation, raises many uneasy questions. Here, I shall refer briefly to a paper on Chinese painting. The western author, in searching for 'progression' in the history of Chinese painting (he locates such a progression in the quest for realism in western art) finally ends up with the realization that, one has to look at the history of Chinese painting as one looks at the history of the western book. What comes to light in the process, to my mind, is also the realization that the western approach to reading a book and looking at a painting are perhaps distinctively different, while they have a lot in common in the Chinese tradition.

        Perhaps in a similar way to the Chinese, the relation between reading, viewing an image, seeing a dance performance and listening to music have some underlying common principle in the Indian context. It is this, which makes the notion of 'translation' unnecessary and internalizes it so that, one does not reflect upon it or theorize its difficulties. The element that holds all the kalas altogether, makes transmutations and finally transformations so effortless and easy is the concept of 'bhava' (tentatively translated as a 'composite of emotions and accompanying physiological states') and the unstated notion of 'rasa'.

      Perhaps this is a point that needs some clarification. Bharata, in the Natya Sastra, among many things discusses rasa, and considers it the soul of the entire dramatic experience. Since, then, through the centuries, different aesthetic principles have been highlighted, namely alankaras (figures of speech and sound), riti (styles), vakroti (indirection) etc. However, by the 11th century rasa established itself as the most powerful and dominant aesthetic theory, chiefly in the context of kavya. However, its implications are far reaching, so that in all the kalas, it is accepted as the underlying intent and bhava figures prominently.

          But what is rasa? Let us roughly translate it as aesthetic relish, as well as the state of mind that it generates in the person who relishes a kala. Its methodology is roughly that of the logic of emotion. What I wish to suggest is that a work of art, with the progression of time, generates a mood as well as psycho-physiological state combining emotion and bodily reactions, and intensifies it. Let us call this bhava. When this process of experiencing becomes so intense that one forgets oneself, one's ego, one’s awareness of space and time, loses himself/herself in the work, one relishes rasa. And whether one is talking about vastu, chitra, nritya, gana or kavya, this term - bhava - figures as the core essence to be communicated. (Bhava figures as a very important category in the seminal theoretical writings in each of the fields mentioned). And at the culminating point of the experience of bhava is the notion of rasa. In other words, the intent of all kalas is the same - to generate bhava and in the final count, stated or unstated, rasa.

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