Emergent Forms: Buddhist Poetical Language and Its Contexts, Session 2

Did poetical language and Buddhism co-create each other around the turn of the Common Era in South Asia? If so, how? And what are the implications for the beginnings of Indic literature and for the development of Buddhist, Vedic, Jain, and other literary and religious traditions of Asia? Our seminar hosts four research presentations on sources from early to early medieval South Asia, bringing them into conversation with each other through formal responses and general discussion. In this second session, Andrew Ollett and Aleksandra Restifo respectively examine the cultivation of kāvya by Buddhist poets in the first three centuries of the common era, and how Jains envisioned aesthetic experience in the context of renunciation through early dramatic literature. Laurie Patton's and Thomas Mazanec's responses will broadly contextualize their presentations and raise questions in light of major scholarly paradigms concerning the history and development of Indic and Chinese literature.