Abstract
The most famous love story in the world is probably that of Romeo and Juliet. Its Tamil parallel is that of Ambikapati and Amaravati, and their sad story is unfolded here. The points of comparison between the two stories as well as the role of fate in the tragic outcome of the both are discussed in brief.
Introduction
The place for romantic love in a culture is of great interest for study and appreciation. Tales of romance—real or imaginary—are plentiful and some of them have attained immortality. Some of them have a happy ending but, unfortunately, many end tragically.
Shakespeare has glorified Romeo and Juliet. The two are archetypes of love—noble, likeable, and pitiful. Shakespeare’s Antony and Cleopatra belong to a different category where political ambitions, treachery, and adultery are prominent.
It was the tradition of ancient literature that the names of the lovers were never given; they are constituting idealized figures. In later ages, including the modern era, lovers were and are named in literature. Men and women being men and women, love as it exists today has fancifully been classified as sad, mad and bad in addition to the good one. Tamil literature, including that borrowed from the Sanskrit, has outstanding examples for each, namely, that of Ambikapati and Amaravati (sad), Shurpanakha for Lord Rama (mad) and Kichaka for Panchali (bad).
Characters such as Romeo and Juliet blossom in Tamil literature as the tragic legend of Ambikapati and Amaravati, although such popular folklore is not much known outside Tamil Nadu.
1
Most probably the lovers are imaginary, but their parents were real and historical figures. The father of Amaravati was the popular Chola king Kulothunga II, who ruled the Chola kingdom (1136-1150
Ambikapati and Amaravati
Ambikapati 2 was the son of the legendary poet, Kambar, who wrote the Ramayanam in Tamil. Kambar was hailed as Kavi Chakravarti (the Emperor of Poesy). He flourished during the reign of Kulothunga Chola II. Ambikapati too is said to be a great poet. Amaravati was the princess and daughter of Kulothunga Chola II, the Chola emperor at that time. She was in love with Ambikapati, which led to his execution.
Ambikapati and Amaravati were in divine love. The emperor got suspicious about them and, to confirm the same, he one day invited Kambar and Ambikapati for dinner at the royal palace. Both father and son were seated in the dining hall. Amaravati served the food. Ambikapati got mesmerized with the celestial beauty of Amaravati and, enraptured, started to sing a poem in praise of her beauty. The emperor was pushed to the limit of his anger. Kambar understood the danger unleashed. He forthwith completed the song as one praising Saraswati, the Goddess of learning, and saved his son.
However, the love of Ambikapati and Amaravati was subsequently proven. The emperor wished to punish Ambikapati with death. Kambar begged the emperor for mercy. The emperor’s teacher, Ottakkoothar, was also a great poet but had an inveterate hatred for Kambar as the latter was hailed by all as the greatest of all poets. Ottakkoothar advised the emperor to conduct a test whereby Ambikapati should sing 100 stanzas of devotion without a word on romantic love. If he succeeded, he would be forgiven and granted the hand of Amaravati. If he failed, he would be condemned to death.
For Ambikapati, this was child’s play. The next day the court assembled. Ambikapati was brought there. Amaravati was hiding behind a screen so as not to distract Ambikapati from his devotional focus. Ambikapati started a with an invocation addressed to Goddess Saraswati which, by convention, would not be counted in the hundred stanzas of the ordeal. However, Amaravati counted that verse as the first. She continued to count the verses as Ambikapati sang them, one rose for each verse. At the end of the 99th stanza, concluding wrongly that the test was completed, she appeared joyously in front of Ambikapati. As soon as he eyed Amaravati, he sung a stanza of love for her.
Ottakkoothar arose and said that Ambikapati had to sing one more to win the test. Ambikapati was declared to have lost, sentenced to death, and executed. The grief-stricken Kambar left the country. Amaravati died of a broken heart. The lovers were thus united in death.
That this tale is entirely apocryphal is vouchsafed not only by the absence of any external references but also by the style and vocabulary of all the poems cited in connection with it. However, it was so popular that it was made into a movie twice, first in 1937 with M. K. Thyagaraja Bhagavathar, the first superstar of Tamil cinema, in the titular role. 3 It was directed by Ellis R. Dungan, an equally legendary director and an American to boot. Dungan borrowed liberally from Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, especially the balcony scene. He also introduced the first kissing scene in Tamil cinema. The movie was a runaway success. The second movie was produced in 1957 with Sivaji Ganesan, the greatest of Tamil actors, in the lead. 4 This was much less a success.
Romeo and Juliet
Romeo and Juliet 5 is a tragedy written by Shakespeare about two young “star-crossed lovers” whose deaths ultimately reconcile their feuding families. It was among Shakespeare’s most popular plays. Today, the title characters are regarded as archetypal young lovers. Tragic love has been a staple theme in most civilizations and Tamil culture is no exception.
An age-old story between two powerful families ending in bloodshed, the play, set in the city of Verona in Italy, begins with a street brawl between Capulet and Montague servants who, like their masters, are sworn enemies. Prince Escalus intervenes and declares that further breach of the peace will be punishable by death.
Romeo’s cousin Benvolio talks to him about his recent depression and finds that it stems from infatuation for Rosaline. Benvolio and Merculio persuade Romeo to meet Rosaline. At Capulets house, instead of meeting Rosaline, he meets and falls in love with Juliet.
Tybalt, Juliet’s cousin, enraged at Romeo wanted to kill him, but was stopped by Juliet’s father, who does not wish to shed blood in his house. After the ball, in what is now called the “balcony scene,” Romeo overhears Juliet at her window vowing her love to him in spite of her family’s hatred of the Montagues. After making himself known to Juliet, Romeo and Juliet agree to be married. Friar Laurence hopes to reconcile the two families through their children’s union, they are secretly married the next day.
Tybalt, incensed that Romeo had sneaked into the Capulet ball, challenges Romeo to a duel. Romeo refuses to fight. Mercutio gets offended by Tybalt’s insolence, as well as Romeo’s “vile submission,” and accepts the duel on Romeo’s behalf. Romeo attempts to break up the fight when Mercutio is fatally wounded. Wracked with guilt, Romeo confronts and slays Tybalt.
Benvolio argues that Romeo was right in executing Tybalt for the murder of Mercutio. The Prince exiles Romeo from Verona under penalty of death if he ever returns. Romeo and Juliet consummate their marriage in Juliet’s chamber. Capulet agrees to marry her to Count Paris and threatens to disown her when she refuses to become Paris’s “joyful bride.” When she pleads for the delay in marriage, her mother rejects her.
Juliet visits Laurence for help, and he offers her a potion that will put her into a deathlike coma for “two and forty hours.” The Friar promises Juliet to send a messenger to inform Romeo of the plan. She takes the drug on the night before the wedding, and, when discovered apparently dead, she is laid in the family crypt.
The messenger does not reach Romeo; instead, Romeo learns of Juliet’s apparent death from his servant, Balthasar. Heartbroken, he buys poison from an apothecary and goes to the Capulet crypt, where he encounters Paris who has come to mourn Juliet privately. Paris confronts Romeo, and in the ensuing battle, Romeo kills Paris. Believing Juliet to be dead, he drinks the poison. Juliet then awakens only to discover that Romeo is dead; she stabs herself with Romeo’s dagger and joins him in death. Both the families and the Prince meet at the tomb to find all three dead. Laurence recounts the story of the two “star-crossed lovers.” Families get reconciled by their children’s deaths and agree to end their violent feud. The play ends with the Prince’s elegy for the lovers: “For never was a story of more woe/Than this of Juliet and her Romeo.”
Discussion
“Love is blind,” goes the adage. Love is blind not just in the target but also regarding the chances of success, the various complications that attend it and even the suitableness of each other.
Love has often been described as insanity in normal life. It is said that love is the taking over of a rational and lucid mind by delusion and self-destruction. The two lovers lose themselves; they have no power over themselves and they are disabled from clarity of thinking (Marilyn French 6 ). Inexplicability, irrationality, loss of touch with reality, heightened emotional levels, impetuosity, and loss of control are but a few of the features common to love and insanity.
In the case of Ambikapati and Amaravati, the lovers are passionately in love, unmindful of societal norms and the attendant dangers. Ambikapati is supremely confident of coming out victorious from the fatal test. Amaravati is totally sure of his success. The impatient Amaravati erred in calculating the number of verses sung by him. She emerged prematurely from the balcony to his sight when he was still one verse short. Ambikapati, son to Kambar, the Emperor of Poets, and no mean poet himself, depended not on himself but on Amaravati, an excitable damsel, for keeping count for the tally of verses. At the sight of the dazzling beauty of Amaravati, Ambikapati blundered into concluding that his target had been met successfully. He at once poured out a poem describing Amaravati’s physical beauty and surcharged with romantic love. The haste of both led to the waste of their lives. Ambikapati was executed and Amaravati died of a broken heart.
Similarly, in the story of Romeo and Juliet, Romeo drinks poison before Juliet wakes up from her induced state of inanimation in the tomb. After the death of Romeo, Juliet commits suicide, which was only too expectable. The hasty decision of Romeo results in the death of the lovers.
In spite of the spread of rationalism, most people set great store by the absolute power of fate. This also has been a matter of absolute conviction since ancient times, as witnessed by the following classical poetry lines:
What power ‘s so great as those of Destiny? Man’s skill
Some other thing contrives; but fate’s beforehand still.
—St. Valluvar, The Holy Kural (380), Trans: Dr G. U. Pope)
Fate never fails but, of a certain, appears
And feeds to the doer the fruit of his deeds.
—Ilanko Atikal, Silappadikaram (“The Tale of the Anklet”), Trans: Dr T. R. Suresh
Fate plays a supreme role in both the stories. Amaravati miscalculates the verses. Obviously, Ambikapati had not informed Amaravati that the very first verse sung constitutes the invocation and the work proper commences only next. Did he presume she would have been aware of this poetic convention? We are not told.
Similarly, the message carrying the scheme of Juliet’s fake-death miscarried and Romeo never received it. But the other news—that of her apparent death—reached him unfailingly. He rushes back to her tomb, just a few minutes too early to discover she was still alive. Thus, in both the stories, several things went wrong which should have gone right, while several things went right which should have gone otherwise. For want of a better and rational explanation this is held as the doing of cruel Fate.
If only Ambikapati had tutored Amaravati the correct way of enumerating verses, if only Amaravati had waited till the result of the fatal test was announced, if only Ambikapati had not lost his head on seeing Amaravati…. So many “ifs” could have come into play to save the lovers but none did.
In the same vein, if only Juliet’s message had not miscarried but reached Romeo, if only the false news of Juliet’s death had miscarried and not reached Romeo, if only the apothecary who concocted the fatal draught for Romeo had erred in his combination or at least been much slower in preparing and delivering it, if only Romeo’s horse had been a wee bit slower, if only Juliet’s drug had given way a few minutes earlier. Again, so many “ifs.” None became a reality. They all stayed “ifs.”
No wonder Shakespeare called them “a pair of star-crossed lovers.” Fate trumped the lovers, but love triumphed to invest them with immortality, a beacon light for countless lovers in the centuries that have followed.
