काव्यप्रकाश (आचार्य मम्मट - सम्पूर्ण १० उल्लास सटीक)

.Preface to the First Edition This is the second Sanskrit work on the Science of Poetry that . is being offered to the English-reading public in an English garb— if we do not count the Bhāshā-Bhūshana, a Hindī work on the same subject, which was rendered into English and published in the pages of the Indian Antiquary in 1894, by Dr. Grierson, whose labours in the cause of Hindī literature rival those of the late Mr. Growse. The first was the Sāhitya-Darpana of Vishwanātha Kavirāja, which was placed over twenty years ago before the public by Rai Bahadur Pramadā Dāsa Mittra, in an English form, that still remains a model of scholarly and excellent translation. It is time that another work on the subject, expounding more or less different views on impor- tant points, should be published. Indeed it is surprising that so little attention should have been directed to this department of Sanskrit learning by Oriental Scholars. For, as it seems to the present writer, the Sāhitya literature of India is remarkably full and complete, and contains perhaps as many useful ideas worth the acceptance of foreign scholars as the literature of philosophy. With the growth of interest and study in metaphysics and psy- chology there has undoubtedly grown on parallel lines, in Europe, interest in and study of the philosophy of other sciences. And we see excellent books issued from the press day after day, which seek to clear up the fundamental ideas of Law, of History, of Politics, of the Physical Sciences and of the various branches of Art. In short there has been a general growth of introspective “Intelligence” on all matters, and an effort is perceptible everywhere to locate every portion of knowledge in its proper place in a universal scheme. There has been no philosopher worthy of the name, who has left an impress other than merely ephemeral on subsequent literature, and has not endeavoured so to organise the whole of human knowledge into one complete whole, or not matured ideas on all matters interest- ing to humanity. But it must be confessed that the literature on the science and philosophy of poetry is not excessively rich in English. Works on poets, dramatists, novelists, and on the history of literature abound; and naturally many of such works, principally biographical,