The Flight of Love

A Messenger Poem of Medieval South India by Venkatanatha

Translated with Commentary by Steven P. Hopkins

Combines philological scholarship with a close reading of Sanskrit texts in the historical stream of South Asian Literatures
The author is himself a scholar and poet, translating the work of the medieval saint-poet Vedantedesika, who was a poet and a philosopher/ theologian

The Flight of Love

A Messenger Poem of Medieval South India by Venkatanatha

Translated with Commentary by Steven P. Hopkins

Description

After a sleepless night spent longing for his absent wife Sita, Rama, god-prince and future king, surveyed his army camps on a clear autumn morning and spied a white goose playing in a pond of lotus flowers. Seeing this radiant creature who so resembled his lost beloved, he began to plead with the bird to give her a message of love and fierce revenge.

This is the setting of the Hamsasandesa A Message for the Goose, a sandesa or "messenger poem" by the medieval saint-poet and philosopher Venkatanatha, a seminal figure for the Srivaisnava religious community of Tamil Nadu, South India, and a master poet in Sanskrit and Tamil. In The Flight of Love, Steven P. Hopkins situates Venkatanatha's Sanskrit sandesa within the wider comparative context of South Indian and Sri Lankan literatures. He traces the significance of messenger poetry in the construction of sacred landscapes in pre-modern South Asia and explores the ways the Hamsasandesa re-envisions the pan-Indian story of Rama and Sita, rooting its protagonists in a turbulent emotional world where separation, overwhelming desire, and anticipated bliss, are written into the living particularized bodies of lover and beloved, in the "messenger" goose and in the landscapes surrounding them.

Hopkins's translation of the Hamsasandesa into fluid American English verse is framed by a comparative introduction, including an extended essay on translation, detailed linguistic notes, and an expanded thematic commentary that weaves together traditional religious interpretations of the poem with themes of contemporary literary relevance.

The Flight of Love

A Messenger Poem of Medieval South India by Venkatanatha

Translated with Commentary by Steven P. Hopkins

Preface
Pronunciation of Sanskrit and Tamil Words

Chapter 1. Introduction. Lovers, Messengers and Beloved Landscapes
Chapter 2. The Flight of Love. The Hamsasandesa
Chapter 3. "To See What the Heart Hears:" The Magic Lantern of Venkatesa
Epilogue: The Rain Messenger and the Wild Goose
Glossary of Names and Terms

Bibliography
Notes
Index

The Flight of Love

A Messenger Poem of Medieval South India by Venkatanatha

Translated with Commentary by Steven P. Hopkins

Author Information

Steven P. Hopkins is Professor of Religion and Coordinator of Asian Studies at Swarthmore College in Pennsylvania. He is the author of Singing the Body of God: The Hymns of Vedantadesika in Their South Indian Tradition and An Ornament for Jewels: Love Poems for the Lord of Gods by Vedantadesika, which was awarded the 2010 South Asia Council of the Association for Asian Studies A.K. Ramanujan Book Prize for Translation.

The Flight of Love

A Messenger Poem of Medieval South India by Venkatanatha

Translated with Commentary by Steven P. Hopkins

Reviews and Awards

"The Flight of Love, with its exploration of South Indian messenger poems, is a solid effort to show the significance of Sanskrit and Indian literature and the role it plays in the cultures, religions, and sacred spaces found amongst one of the largest and oldest human populations. Hopkins's book shows that simple messenger poems hold larger meaning by his connections of verses to the landscape of Tamil Nadu with powerful imagery and emotion."--Anjeanette LeBoeuf, Reading Religion

"Reading this wonderful book really does feel like flying. The translation is peerless, and Hopkins's fine meditation on what it took to get there is a close second. We're lucky to have both."-John Stratton Hawley, author of A Storm of Songs: India and the Idea of the Bhakti Movement

"Steven Hopkins brings alive the experience of anubhava, enjoyment, so central to the reading practices of the Srivaisnava ava tradition through a luminous and deeply felt translation of Venkatanatha's Hamsasandesa. His incisive and evocative readings, informed equally by Srivaisnava exegesis and literary theory, cover as vast a territory as the poem's royal goose does on its message of love. The Flight of Love is a book to be savored."-Archana Venkatesan, author of The Secret Garland: Antal's Tiruppavai and Nacciyar Tirumoli

"As a faithful, yet eminently readable, translation of a beautiful work of Sanskrit poetry, The Flight of Love is an unqualified success. Hopkins adeptly captures the lyricism, mood, and idiom of the original and, through his insightful commentary and notes, brings out its social, historical, linguistic, religious, and aesthetic significance. The introduction itself is a valuable resource for learning about the genres of Sanskrit poetry and the history of South India and Hinduism in the medieval period."-Deven M. Patel Author of Text to Tradition: The Naisadhiyacarita and Literary Community in South Asia