Female Adolescence in Indian Lyric Poetry

While the hero (nāyaka) of classical Sanskrit lyric poetry is, as a rule, an adult and a consummate lover, that is not the case with the heroine (nāyikā). Poets, anthologists and theoreticians of literature distinguish the various types, which differ, among other things, in their age and experience in love matters. They include the adolescent heroine, who is depicted during the process of her transformation from a little girl into a young maiden. This motif, referred to as vayaḥsaṃdhi, was also introduced into the medieval lyric poetry of north-eastern India, thanks to the famous Maithili poet Vidyāpati (14th–15th centuries CE), who used it in his songs on the adolescence of Kr̥ṣṇa’s beloved Rādhā. The paper analyses in detail selected instances of the use of the motif in Sanskrit and Maithili sources, with a particular focus on metaphors employed to explain the liminal period of adolescence to the poems’ listeners or readers.