Humanity is
absolutely dwarfed and its powers rendered inoperative by the crowd of
supernatural creatures that control its destiny. Even in the "Tempest"
of Shakespeare, in which the supernatural plays a greater part than in
any other English drama, the strength and nobility of human character
are allowed full play--and man in his fortitude, in his intellect and
will, even more than in his emotions, keeps full possession of the
stage, and imparts a reality to every scene which makes the wildest
flight of fancy bear a real relation to the common experiences of human
life.
The "Sakoontala" is divided into seven acts, and is a mixture of prose
and verse;--each character rising in the intensity of emotional
utterance into bursts of lyric poetry. The first act introduces the King
of India, Dushyanta, armed with bow and arrows, in a chariot with his
driver. They are passing through a forest in pursuit of a black
antelope, which they fail to overtake before the voice of some hermit
forbids them to slay the creature as it belongs to the hermitage. The
king piously desists and reaches the hermitage of the great saint Kanwa,
who has left his companions in charge of his foster-daughter,
Sakoontala, while he is bound on a pilgrimage.
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