KANNADA POETRY AND SANSKRIT PROSODY
The
relationship between Kannada poetry and Sanskrit prosody is a corollary of the
relationship that prevailed between those languages at various points of time in
the history of Kannada language. It should be borne in mind that every language
has its own distinctive features that are conducive to particular metrical
patterns. For instance, Dravidian languages do not usually have more than two
or three syllables in a single word and this has its own impact on its poetry.
Similarly, Kannada does not revel in long compounded words. (DIrGa samAsa) and
Sanskrit has a panache for such formations. As a result, any language that
retains its original form without invasive onslaught of alien languages has a
tendency to stick to its own prosodic patterns and innovations if any are
internal. On the contrary foreign influences, that too an influx of loan words
in to the cultural vocabulary could influence the prosodic patterns also.
Kannada,
which is a Dravidian language must have passed through a stage where it did not
have any contact with Sanskrit. The literature that came in to being during
that period was obviously oral and not much has survived from those days.
However, it goes with out saying that many prosodic forms that are indigenous
to Kannada were used by these oral poets. A look at Tamil literature of this
early period bears witness to these conjectures. Kannada might have been akin
to the prose that we see in ‘vaDDArAdhane’.
However,
Kannada did come in to contact with the itinerant emissaries of Buddhism and
Jainism. The expansionist tendencies of kings and monarchs furthered these
activities. Consequently one finds a tangible presence of Sanskrit words even
in the earliest documentations of Kannada dating back to 5th century
A.D. Most of our inscriptions have a style and structure that combine Kannada
and Sanskrit. For instance, the Badami Inscription of 7th century
uses ‘tripadi’ and indigenous prosodic form but it has a number words borrowed
from Sanskrit.
If
we move on to the literary texts, one finds that the ‘Champu tradition’ and the
prosodic forms of Sanskrit are interwoven. This is true whether we are talking
about a literary classic such as ‘AdipurANa’ or a knowledge based work like
‘kavirAjamArga.’ It is to be noted that Kannada poets were not un duly
impressed by the ‘Vaidic Prosody’ that made use of ‘slOkas, but preferred
‘Laukik Meters’ such as ‘Vrutta’and ‘’kanda padya’. Even here they were quite
choosy and picked only a handful among thousands of options available. For
instance ‘khyAta karnATaka vrutta’s are only six in number and even among them
two are used very sparingly. An exception was made only in the case of ‘kanda
padya’ and that form makes use of ‘mAtrA gaNa chandassu’. Kannada did take the
idea of mAtrAgaNa from Sanskrit but used them in forms that were indigenous to
the language. Forms like ‘mAlA vrutta’ and ‘danDaka’ were used very sparingly.
With
the passage of time, the prosodic forms of Sanskrit were found only in Champu
works whether it was the tenth century or seventeenth century. A shift to
medieval Kannada from old Kannada went with the usage of non Sanskrit prosodic
forms. Vocabulary was replete with Sanskrit words but the prosody under went a
transformation. However Kannada did not go back to the indigenous forms of the
pre Sanskrit days. Both ‘akshara gaNa’ and ‘amsha gaNa’ gravitated towards
‘mAtrA gaNas’ which suited the genius of Kannada. It may be mentioned in
passing that Bendre a great poet of the twentieth century experimented with
Vedic meters and wrote a few poems in that genre.
Some
poets who had panache for classical music have used Sanskrit prosodic forms
coupled with musical nuances in their poems.