"Bhartrihari is one of the important poets of Sanskrit Literature. It is said that he belonged to the first century B.C and that he was the elder brother of King Vikramaditya, the great ruler of Ujjain.
Bhartr̥ihari was not only a great King. He was a great scholar, a great poet, a great Yogi, a versatile genius and above all a great Vedantin. He has written many works in Sanskrit. Three of them are popular poems consisting of one hundred verses each. They are-the Shringara Satakam, the Niti Satakam and the Vairagya Satakam. Satakam means a work consisting of 100 verses.
Vairagya Satakam is a philosophical work dealing with the subject of liberation. Vairagyam means detachment. So, this work deals with the subject of Vairagyam as a pre requisite for liberation.
This audio book gives a brief overview of this poem in English along with the recitation of all the 100 verses."
"The Meghadhuta also known as Meghasandesam is one of the beautiful works of Kalidasa. It is a poem in Sanskrit Language consisting of 117 verses. It is actually one of a few minor compositions of Kalidasa. Being one of the greatest poets of Sanskrit Literature, he has produced epics like the Raghuvamsa Mahakavya and Kumarasambhavam and dramas like Abigyana Sakuntalam.
The ideas contained in this poem is simple but romantic. Alaka is a mountain in the Himalayas. The god of wealth, Kubera is the king of this place. He has a group of divine attendants working for him. These attendants are known as Yakshas. One of these Yakshas was very much smitten and obsessed with his wife. Hence, he ignored his duties. Kubera, therefore, cursed him and banished him into the woods on planet Earth. The Yaksha came to a mountainous place called Ramagiri named after Lord Rama near the present state of Chattisgarh in India and was residing in an ashram there.
The Yaksha spent several months on the mountain. Thoroughly dejected, the love-lorn Yaksha keeps thinking about his wife. His wife also keeps thinking about him all day and all night. It is the time of monsoon. The Yaksha sees a rain cloud passing by. He requests the cloud to carry a message to his wife. The Yaksha then starts to describe the route that the cloud should take to meet his lover. This forms the crux of the verses of this poem.
The works of Kalidasa are synonymous with the beauty of nature, lyrical poetry, dramatic stories, great heroes and sensuous heroines. The Meghadhuta focusses mainly on sensual love and the beauty of nature. Kalidasa’s genius lies in making these two subjects flow into each other in this work. For example, Kalidasa picturises the rivers as sensuous women, and he advises his friend namely the cloud to take interest in the rivers along the way on his journey from the plains to Alaka."
"Oliver Goldsmith was a famous English writer. Among his writings is a prose collection of essays titled “The Citizen of the World”. The “The Man in Black” is a piece of writing from this collection of essays. In this essay, Goldsmith makes a mockery of the then contemporary society. He attacks the social and political situation that dominated during Anglo-Saxon period in England.
Goldsmith subtly discourages some of the deficiencies of the then society through this article. Through this writing he mocks at the society for exhibiting the trend of showing ‘what you are not’. In a subtle way he ridicules the pretentiousness of the society by portraying a contrasting character. The Man in Black is a character created by Goldsmith for this purpose. The mockery of the then society is exhibited through a routine walk and conversation between the Man in Black and his friend.
The Man in Black is a very interesting character. He is inconsistent. He does not practice what he preaches. He is a kind, sympathetic, and genial person with a compassionate heart. Outwardly, however, he seems unkind, looking like a rude, curt, and stern person. This is in contrast with his inner personality. Goldsmith is mentioning this man as the ‘Man in Black’ because this man seems black outside but white and noble inside."
"Hymns, which are known as Stotras in Sanskrit, are a type of popular devotional literature which are in vogue in the Indian way of life. Stotras are the outpourings of the heart of a devotee of God. Generally, they are in the in the form of poems. A Bhajan is also another important type of devotional literature. Bhajan is any type of devotional song. It has no fixed form. It is normally lyrical, expressing love for the Divine. It belongs to a genre of music and arts that developed during the time of the Bhakti Movement that spread from the south of India throughout the entire subcontinent during the Moghul era.
Lord Krishna is a well-known deity in Hinduism. This audio book presents five stotras on Lord Krishna recited by me and two bhajans rendered by my daughter Nithya Venkataraman.
The two bhajans are: Muddhugare Yashoda and Maadhava Maamava.
The stotras are:
Madhurashtkam
Govinda Damodara Stotram
Mukundamala
Govindashtakam and
Bala Mukundashtakam"
