We take pleasure in presenting this little book to lovers of Indian classical dance of Odissi, in particular. It is the fruit of a partnership between a philosopher who has inquired into the aesthetics of Indian music and dance, and a practising Odissi dancer.
Together, we have tried our best to be maximally true not only to how Odissi has been conceived and designed as a classical dance form, but to the way it is actually presented on the stage. At places, however, where our united effort has failed to unravel a particular point in the run of Odissi as actually danced, help has come from Smt Madhavi Mudgal to whom we are naturally grateful. We are just as beholden to Shri Vinay Jain who has designed the book with his customary eye not only for visual appeal, but for relevance to the subject of the work.
It is hardly necessary to add that our knowledge of the dance-form, which the present book deals with, is by no means exhaustive, and that it may therefore be found lacking in more ways than one.
We close this book with the hope that it will serve to encourage similar-and perhaps better-writing on Odissi as well as other forms of classical dance in India, all alike replete with subtleties of both conception and stage presentation. It is good, but not enough, to dance beautifully. We must also understand what this beauty is and how it is evoked.
It is commonplace to speak of a work of art as a compact wholeness. Coherence and completeness are indeed regarded as its essential attributes. In our classical dances, however, these qualities can obtain in a distinctive way. In the case of quite a few of their individual items, the overall aesthetic significance derives explicitly, if in part, from a mudra, which is itself a tiny gesture, but is used to make for some growing significance, be it as expressiveness or as representation. So, the 'bud-blossom' image which figures in the title of this work is no mere ornament.
But, warranted though it be, the title is not the work in its entirety, and one may well wonder as to how the present book is needed at all. Here, some answer may be had by just taking a look at its contents. They all aim at providing an analytic account of Odissi dance in the way of contemporary (Western) aesthetics.
**Contents and Sample Pages**
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