“And when you get the chance to sit it out or dance, I hope you dance”. During dark times, artists dance and sing about the rites of living, sometimes about the dark times and sometimes about our hope that the best may still arrive. Across the world, amidst the suffering caused by the pandemic, dancers who could not enter theatres, who had lost colleagues, danced on streets, provided their music and movement and brought cheer to whoever was around. They ‘danced love, they danced joy and they danced dreams’ (Gene Kelly). This elegant book celebrates dance, emotion and the gorgeous Sohini Roychowdhury. It is a brief reflection of Natyashastra, (dates vary from 500 BC to 500 AD), with its 36 chapters and 6,000 poetic verses. It depicts dance and the navarasa described by Abhinavagupta, the Kashmiri Shaiva philosopher, (1000 AD), who is among the world’s greatest thinkers. A literary critic, a mystic and aesthetician, he has contributed much to Hindu philosophy, literature and the performing arts and is similar in stature and impact to Plato or Aristotle, the celebrated foundation stones of western civilization. His work on navarasa changed thoughts about emotions and their depiction and hence art itself, as all artists offer emotion and convey it through their art. Their goal is to transport the audience into another wondrous reality and help us experience their feelings, our own consciousness and reflect on existence. So we too enter ecstasy like Rumi, the master dancing on the streets of Kona, “Dance, when you're broken open. Dance, when you've torn the bandage off. Dance in the middle of the fighting. Dance in your blood. Dance when you're perfectly free.”
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My body is your temple
