We know definitely of very few dramatists of the eighth and ninth centuries. Kalhaṇa[1] mentions expressly Yaçovarman of Kanyakubja as a patron of literature, who, as we have seen, patronized Bhavabhūti and Vākpati, and we learn of his drama Rāmābhyudaya, which is mentioned by Ānandavardhana in the Dhvanyāloka, by Dhanika and Viçvanātha, but has not yet been found. To Kalhaṇa[2] also we are indebted for knowledge of the period of Çivasvāmin, who lived under Avantivarman of Kashmir (A.D. 855–83) and was a contemporary of the poet Ratnākara. He wrote many Nāṭakas and Nāṭikās, and also Prakaraṇas, but save an occasional verse in the anthologies his fame is lost.
Anan̄gaharṣa Mātrarāja,[3] on the other hand, is known to Ānandavardhana and Abhinavagupta, and his play Tāpasavatsarājacarita is a variation on the theme of the ruse of Yaugandharāyaṇa to secure the marriage of Vatsa and Padmāvatī, in face of the deep love of the king for Vāsavadattā. Vatsa in this drama, which is of little poetic or dramatic value, becomes an ascetic on learning of his queen’s supposed fate, whence the title of the play. Padmāvatī, who had become enamoured of the king from a portrait sent by the minister, follows suit. Eventually Vāsavadattā and Vatsa are united in Prayāga when each is about to commit suicide in sorrow at separation, and the usual victory is reported by Rumaṇvant to give a happy ending. [[221]]There seems little doubt that the author used the Ratnāvalī, which gives the upper limit of his date. His father’s name is given as Narendravardhana.
Māyurājā[4] has been less fortunate in that his Udāttarāghava is known only by reference. Rājaçekhara represents him as a Karaculi or Kulicuri, which suggests the possibility that he was a king of the Kalacuri dynasty, of which unhappily we know little during the period in which he is probably to be set. He seems to have known Bhavabhūti. Like him he eliminated treachery from the slaying of Vālin by Rāma, and he represents Lakṣmaṇa as first to follow the magic gazelle, and Rāma as going later in pursuit. He is cited more than once in Dhanika’s commentary on the Daçarūpa.
No other dramatist of this period is known with any certainty; the Pārvatīpariṇaya once ascribed to Bāṇa is now allotted to Vāmana Bhaṭṭa Bāṇa (c. A.D. 1400), and the Mallikāmāruta, wrongly thought to be Daṇḍin’s, is the work of one Uddaṇḍin of the seventeenth century.
Of these dramatists Yaçovarman has had the honour of being considered worthy of quotation by the writers on theory who have preserved for us some interesting verses:[5]
ākrandāḥ stanitair vilocanajalāny açrāntadhārāmbhubhis
tvadvicchedabhuvaç ca çokaçikhinas tulyās taḍidvibhramaiḥ
antar me dayitāmukhaṁ tava çaçī vṛttiḥ samāpy āvayoḥ
tat kim mām aniçaṁ sakhe jaladhara dagdhum evodyataḥ.
‘My moans are like thy thunder, the floods of my tears thy ever-streaming showers, the flame of my sorrow at severance from my beloved thy flickering lightning, in my mind is her face reflected, in thee the moon; like is our condition; why then, O friend, O cloud, dost thou ever seek to consume me with the burning pangs of love?’