Women in Indian Sculpture

This volume on the Woman in Indian Sculpture has stressed the image of the Indian woman as an icon of fertility, bounty and fruition. The author has written about the poetic conceit of the woman and the tree, quickening each other to flower and fruit, about yakshis apotheosizing the life impulse and vibrations of nature, about nayikas epitomizing the
various games and overtures of love, and, about dancers and musicians, entertaining people or their gods. He has illustrated the image of the Indian woman through allusions to literature and the arts. The goddess, in her beneficent or terrible beauty, complements the image of woman as a creative and procreative person, a creature of nature and culture.
Even though the author has offered an exposition of the conventional and popular view of the Indian woman, he still offers clues to help us transcend this view, and to explore the myriad possibilities, fulfilments and longings of Indian womanhood. To adapt Goethe on Abhijnana Shakuntalam:
ìWouldst thou the young yearís blossom and the
Fruit of its decline
Wouldst thou the earth and heaven in one single sole
Name combine
I name thee
The Indian woman and
All at once is said.î