The Sound of the Kiss Read online

  It is, to say the least, an unusual tale of family origins. In popular oral accounts of the genealogy, Peki is a spirit (dayyamu) who came to work for the family when one of the ancestors picked up a glass bead he found lying by the path in a forest. He took it home and hid it in a small shelf on the wall. Immediately thereafter, Peki appeared and began to perform various difficult tasks for the family. One night an elder observed her straightening the wick of an oil lamp with her tongue. Immediately realizing that Peki was no ordinary human being, the family tried to get rid of her in every possible way. Spells, chants, and rituals had no effect. They even shifted their house to a new location—but Peki followed after them, carrying even the heavy mortar they had deliberately left behind. Finally, they asked her what would make her leave. “Just give me my glass bead,” she said. When they retrieved it for her, she took it and disappeared.11

  Such stories reflect a perceived reality. A well-known theme—the troublesome spirit that attaches itself, often through some seemingly innocuous object, to a house—has been grafted onto the poet’s own genealogical memory of the superhuman servant-concubine Peki. In any case, one senses the presence of a powerful “magical” milieu, with its highly charged verbal and ritual devices, just below the surface of the Kaḷāpūrṇodayamu text. The eastern Deccan world of the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries was one where sounds, especially those used correctly by poets, could work change on reality; also one where these potentialities hidden within speech generated theoretical grammars that structured the practical application of metrical composition.12 Grammar has, in addition to its inherited analytic properties, drawn from centuries of linguistic speculation and study in Sanskrit, a deep relation to sorcery. All of this wider range of magical and musical associations is present in Suranna’s novel in surprising ways.

  Suranna has even more to report along these lines in the continuation of the genealogy. This same ancestor Goka had no children from his wife; so the wife worshiped the Sun God, who appeared in her dream as a Brahmin and gave her a donda vine to plant in the yard. The vine grew into a luxuriant state, and as it did so, the wife became fertile; the family exfoliated like the vine.13 Did the descendants of this family, generations later, imagine themselves as carrying on the line of the Sun God or of the musical gandharvi Peki and her Yogic lover—or of both?

  [ 3 ]

  To see how close all this is to the explicit concerns of Suranna’s novel, and also how such concerns have been reformulated and transformed in the direction of classical images, we need only look to one of the opening, invocation verses of the Kaḷāpūrṇodayamu:

  Brahma creates the world

  by words that come forth

  from his four mouths in the form

  of the ancient texts.

  And these words are the goddess herself,

  living on his tongue.

  That’s why he never disobeys her, while she,

  in a way, kisses all his four mouths

  at the same moment.

  May this god of four tongues

  bless King Krishna, Narasimha’s son.

  Brahma creates the world. So far so good. But in fact this creator is entirely caught up in, or driven by, a process that is identified with his wife Sarasvati, the godess who is language. Brahma has four heads, hence also four tongues, and Sarasvati lives on those tongues as Vedic speech—a kind of ultimate, musical utterance that is true. Through this Vedic music-cum-language, Brahma creates the world. He can never disobey it—never, that is, disobey his mellifluous wife. Whenever he speaks, it is she speaking through him; and whenever this happens, he is creating. There is desire latent within this process: the goddess inhabiting Brahma’s four tongues wants to kiss all his mouths at the same moment. That is why she is there, and how she comes into play. Simultaneity is critical. To string the order out in some linear sequence would be to distort, or ruin, the creation. Time itself—the gap in sequence between one micromoment and another—has two inseparable sides to it, “he” and “she.” When one acts, the other is also acting, and this near-simultaneity is immensely consequential. Reality itself emerges from it, rich with linguistic determination. The four Vedas, which is to say, the four linguistic templates of the world, are like an urge to kiss, and without sequential gaps—without time, the field of creation. In this verse, the urge is located initially in the goddess, whose generative speech is this kiss, though it seems as if he is actually speaking. But in the story that lies at the core of the novel, the roles are superficially reversed: there it is Brahma who wants to kiss Sarasvati with all four of his mouths simultaneously. The result is the narrative that Suranna relates. Because Brahma speaks in this special moment, and in this manner, the story becomes real.

  What is this story? We would prefer you to read it as it unfolds, in somewhat circuitous fashion, in the novel itself. For purposes of orientation, before entering into a deeper discussion, we give only a highly condensed summary. Suffice it to say that this is the story of a young courtesan named Kalabhashini from the god Krishna’s city of Dvaraka:

  This beautiful young woman falls in love one day with Nalakubara, the most handsome man in the universe, whom she sees in the company of his lover, Rambha, a courtesan of the gods. Kalabhashini also overhears this pair of lovers speaking about a mysterious person named Kalapurna, whose story must never be told. Burning with curiosity and desire, she follows Narada, great sage and musician, along with his disciple, Manikandhara, to Krishna’s palace. There she is taught the supreme knowledge of music by Krishna’s wife Jambavati; Manikandhara, who is not allowed into the inner part of the palace, still manages to acquire the same musical mastery by listening from outside. Upon completion of these studies, Manikandhara goes on a pilgrimage to various shrines, eventually settling down to a discipline of Yoga and meditation in a grove in Kerala, near the shrine of a local goddess known as Mrigendra-vahana, the Lion-Rider.

  As a meditating Yogin, Manikandhara is a threat to Indra, king of the gods; so the latter sends the alluring Rambha to seduce him. Meanwhile, Kalabhashini arrives at the same area in Kerala in the company of a Siddha magician named Manistambha, who has his own designs on her. An inscription on the temple wall promises that whoever sacrifices a courtesan of perfect beauty, proficient in music, to the goddess there will become a great king. But before Manistambha can carry out his plan, strange entanglements ensue: Nalakubara, Rambha’s usual lover, appears beside his precise double, Manikandhara; while Rambha confronts her own exact image in the form of a magically transformed Kalabhashini. Who is who, and who loves whom? Who will succeed in sacrificing the young courtesan and becoming king?

  At the very height of these confusions, a Malayali Brahmin named Alaghuvrata arrives at the shrine. In his hand he holds, unknown to him, a necklace that originates with the god Krishna, and that gives omniscience to whoever lets its central jewel touch his heart. He watches as Kalabhashini is sacrificed, rather reluctantly, by Manikandhara—Manistambha has, for important reasons, withdrawn. Fortunately, in Kalabhashini’s case, beheading is not quite fatal; Manikandhara, on the other hand, dies in battle with a porcupine demon at the wilderness shrine of Srisailam.

  After two years of meditation, Alaghuvrata is blown by a great wind into the court of an unknown king, to whom he offers the necklace. In the audience is a baby girl; the king wraps the necklace around her neck, the jewel touching her heart—and at once she begins to recount a mysterious tale of the conversation she once overheard, as a parrot, in another life, in the heaven where Brahma, the Creator, plays love-games and word-games with his wife, Speech. But this story—which must not be told—is not quite unknown to its courtly audience. In the course of its telling, Alaghuvrata discovers his four lost sons, wise Brahmin scholars who specialize in learned, bilingual double entendres. Other parts of the story, however, remain opaque for years, for the baby girl rolls over and the magical jewel is displaced from her heart.

  Like all good stories, especially secret one
s, this one must tell of a great love and its occasional impediments. There are two great loves, in fact—both, in some ways, rather routine. Perhaps the most serious problem, in this case, is the lack of a musical instrument equal to the voice and talent of one beloved, the king’s wife, Abhinavakaumudi. To retrieve such an instrument, another visit to the shrine of the Lion-Rider is unavoidable. This is also the perfect opportunity for our king to conquer the entire world.

  It is, of course, a very complicated tale. To make things even harder, its point of departure, the true linear beginning of the events, is buried in the very middle of the novel. We can reach it only by following the precisely planned twists and spins that comprise the story as experienced by its various protagonists. Along the way, the points of view we are offered change constantly, with subtle sensitivity to the psychological reality of each of the participants. Like them, no less confused than they are, we begin to find ourselves in this maze of interlocking cycles and events. There are surprises at nearly every step. Perhaps the most often repeated word in this book is “amazed.”

  We have appended a list of characters, with brief explanatory notes, to help you find your way. We have, however, refrained from recasting the story in a purely lineal mode. We recommend reading the text slowly, paying careful attention to repetitions and the way the key statements are formulated. Nothing here is accidental or incidental; the author has crafted an intricate, deeply logical design that, like everyday life, unravels in minute segments unintelligible without the largely invisible whole.

  This is a book which you should read more than once. Each new development of the story reveals another, unsuspected layer in the earlier episodes, and each reading produces a new perspective. When you have read through the text for the first time, you may find it useful to turn to our “Invitation to a Second Reading,” which we have placed at the end. As you already know, this is a story not meant to be told; it is under a powerful interdiction, with sanctions prescribed against anyone who tells or hears it. We feel, however, that if you choose to read it once, with attention, you will want to read it again.

  [ Note on the Text ]

  The editio princeps, by Baruru Tyagarayasastri in 1888/1889, underlies the first Vavilla Ramasvami Sastrulu and Sons edition (Madras, 1910, reprinted many times). We have used as our basic text the Vavilla 1968 printing, with the laghu-ṭīka of Cadaluvada Jayaramasastri, the only available, though brief, gloss on the Kaḷāpūrṇodayamu. Note that another edition published by Vavilla in the same year lacks this commentary. We have also consulted the edition by Malladi Suryanarayana Sastri, published by the editor in Pithapuram, Sri Vidvad-jana-mano-ranjani Mudra-sala, in 1938. This is the only printed edition that is based on the collation of available manuscripts (the editor cites fourteen of these, including one prepared for C. P. Brown in the early nineteenth century that lacks the eighth chapter). When we prefer a reading by Suryanarayana Sastri, we point this out in the notes.

  We have had no access to the 1909 Kakinada edition by P. V. Ramanayya and Company (of Guntur), at the Sarasvati Mudranalayamu. A modern edition by Bommakanti Venkata Singaracarya and Ballantrapu Nalinikantaravu was published in two volumes by Emesco, Madras, and reissued in Vijayawada in 1997.

  NOTES

  1. From the very beginning of Telugu literature, in the works of the eleventh-century poet Nannaya and his courtly successors, the campū format mixes metrical verse and prose in telling a narrative.

  2. We have omitted the following verses from the translation:

  Pīṭhika 22–69, 75–95, 97–103.

  1. 4–7, 10–12, 17, 21–22, 27–32, 35, 37.

  3. 30.

  4. 79–80, 133–135, 202.

  5. 111,150–55, 157, 162–68, 171, 175–80, 187–88.

  6. 196–99, 201–202, 205, 209–212, 216, 224, 230–33.

  7. 21, 38–40, 68–73, 77–94, 99–100, 103, 110–115, 124–44, 147, 149–50, 170–71, 173, 175, 178–84, 187–88.

  8. 10, 14, 17–18, 24–25, 27, 37, 40–42, 59–69, 97, 99, 103–104, 112, 120–21, 138, 140, 144, 199, 202, 211–221, 223–37.

  Most of these passages are either structured around untranslatable śleṣa or heavily textured to produce primarily phonoaesthetic effects, for example in the vacana prose passages, which we have sometimes abridged.

  3. 5.18

  4. 3.268

  5. The two Rambhas: 3.207.

  6. Thus Malladi Suryanarayana Sastri and Kasi Bhatta Brahmayya Sastri, inter alia: see Vedamu Laksminarayana Sastri’s introduction to the 1957 Vavilla edition of the text, 64.

  7. We borrow the term “bitextuality” from Yigal Bronner’s recent study of śleṣa, “Poetry at Its Extreme: The Theory and Practice of Bitextual Poetry (śleṣa) in South Asia,” Ph.D. dissertation, University of Chicago, 1999.

  8. Suranna composed a Garuḍa-purāṇamu, which is not extant.

  9. Prabhāvatī-pradyumnamu 1.6.

  10. Ibid. 1.12.

  11. Marupuru Kodandarama Reddi, introduction to Andhra Pradesh Sahitya Akademi edition of Kaḷāpūrṇodayamu (Hyderabad, 1980), 2—3.

  12. See D. Shulman, “Notes on Camatkāra,” Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities, in press.

  13. Prabhāvatī-pradyumnamu 1.15.

  [ The Beginning ]

  There is a reality

  that dawns for perceptive minds

  when they are touched by the jewel

  over Vishnu’s heart that shines

  like the morning sun, doubly red

  from the saffron on the breasts

  of the goddess Sri.

  It will brighten your heart, too,

  Narasimha Krishna, King in Nandyala.

  May Krishna, son of Narasingaya,

  see his children multiply

  like lotus flowers in a pond,

  blessed by his family god,

  youthful Krishna who dances

  with the cowherd girls.

  The right hand moves to the left, toward

  her breast. The left hand shyly

  blocks it. Now he’s afraid

  she might be angry, so he caresses her cheek

  and her delicate foot, to appease her.

  This god, half female half male,1

  cares for King Krishna, Narasimha’s son.

  Brahma creates the world

  by words that come forth

  from his four mouths in the form

  of the ancient texts.

  And these words are the goddess herself,

  living on his tongue.

  That’s why he never disobeys her, while she,

  in a way, kisses all his four mouths

  at the same moment.

  May this god of four tongues

  bless King Krishna, Narasima’s son.

  I pay respect to Valmiki,2 the poet born from an anthill,

  and Vyasa,3 son of Satyavati,

  who made a home for poetry

  just as Siva’s long hair

  and the Himalayan slopes

  became home to the river of the sky

  as it flowed down to earth.

  The Mahābhārata and Rāmāyaṇa

  were far away, in a distant tongue,

  hard even to think about.

  Three poets gave them to all of us,

  like a peeled banana,

  in beautiful Telugu, the Andhra language.

  I praise Nannaya, Tikkana, and Errana.4

  Now as to bad poets—

  we might as well forget them.

  If they praise, it’s no honor,

  and if they criticize, it’s no loss.

  They’re like a goatee on a goat,

  not even worthy of ridicule.

  Writing poetry is like milking a cow.

  You have to pause at the right moment.

  You have to feel your way, gently, with a good heart,

  without breaking the rules.

  You need a certain soft way of speaking.

  You can’t use harsh words or cause
a disturbance.

  Your feet should be firm, your rhythm precise.

  It requires a clear focus.

  If it all works right, a poet becomes popular,

  and a cowherd gets his milk.

  If not, they get kicked.

  So now I’ve said my prayers to the gods. I’ve praised the good poets and observed that the best punishment for bad poets is to ignore them. Fully aware that a major composition that is graced by all good features brings fame, while a poor composition gets you kicked out of the court, I was all set to write a great poem on one theme or another.

  One day King Krishna of Nandyala was holding court. His jewels cast an iridescent glow in the space around him, thickly perfumed by the oil of sandalwood and musk covering his body. Around him were his ministers, wise in the wily ways of politics; priests learned in the Vedas and able to ward off evil with their mantras and tantras; logicians and philosophers, expert in the texts of Kanada, Kapila, Gautama, Jaimini, Vyasa, and Patanjali that form the basis of the six major schools, and perfectly capable of smashing the perverse arguments of their opponents; storytellers versed in the Purāṇas, such as Brahma, Padma, Varāha, Vishṇu, Matsya, Mārkaṇḍeya, Bhāgavata, Brahma-vaivarta, Kūrma, Garuḍa, and Skanda; poets just as good as Bana, Bhavabhuti, and Kalidasa in composing all four kinds of poetry—improvised, lyrical, concrete, and narrative; sharp-witted astrologers who know time in all its parts and who can split a moment into its tiny, tinier, and tiniest fragments; physicians versed in Ayurveda and as skilled at healing as Dasra, Caraka, and the doctor of the gods themselves, Dhanvantari; musicians no less able than Visvavasu, Tumburu, Narada, Anjaneya, Bharata, Matanga, Kohala, and Dattila; courtesans who could charm the heart of any man; soldiers whose breasts were so calloused by wounds that they had hardened into a kind of armor. Each of these groups stood, attentive, in its proper place. The king was receiving, with a smile, a look, or a word, the subordinate kings who came to pay respect, as their announcers called out their names. At the same time, he was watching his dancers dance to the music and the drums, and he was also attending to the reports his officers were submitting about the various tasks and departments to which they were appointed. He also lent an ear to the elegant ways his bards were stringing out his praises in new combinations of words and phrases.