and interest should be carefully attended to. In Sanskrit dramas, the unity of action is generally observed and not neccessarily those of time and place. In accordance with the saying "मङ्गलादीनि मङ्गलान्तानि", the play, as it opens with a prayer or blessings, should also end with भरतवाक्य expressing the wishes of some magnanimous personality for universal prosperity and happiness. There is one more convention, though last but not the least: i. e. the hero and the higher characters speak in Sanskrit, while female and other lower characters use a language of different प्राकृत dialects, save those who are educated.
The Trotaka kind of Rupaka, as the play in hand is,may, in accordance with the definition given in the Introduction in Sanskrit, consist of 5, 7, 8 or 9 acts. The characters therein, should be celestial as well as human. Vidushaka must play a prominent part and be present almost in every act. It has no विष्कम्बक but the gap is bridged only by प्रवेशक. In other respects it does not differ from a नाटक ।
The Poet :
“His life, works and poetry"
Like the life of Shakespeare, the life of our poet, the brightest jewel of the mine of the Indian poets, remains unrevealed and blank. In his works, he has kept a dismal silence about himself. Unlike later Sanskrit poets who are often confident and self-puffers, Kalidasa expresses modestly and speaks little of himself. “The personal history" says a learned critic, "is thus involved in an impenetrable mist of obscurity." And this has made an ample room for a diversity of inferences which are open to a great controversy. The late Dr. Bhau Daji remarks that he was a Sarasvat Gauda Brahmin. It is further said that he and Matŗigupta, the king of Kashmir were identical. Some say that he was patronised by Pravarsena, the king of Kashmir. But a time-honoured tradition associates his name with the king Vikramaditya of Ujjain,the founder of Samvat Era. It is reported that Kalidas constituted one of the nine jewels of his Court, Thus runs a saying, that he was appointed the Governor of Kashinir by Vikramaditya. His description of Ujjaini and its surroundings, the Mahakala and the Kshipra firmly leads to the conclusion that he must have been the native of that part. If the king Vikramaditya be not taken as the poet's patron, various references to the name of the king in highly panegyric terms should be set aside without any plausible explanation.
