Rasa

Rasa is the aesthetic relish evoked in an audience by drama, poetry, and other art. Classical Indian aesthetics explains it as a distinct experience arising from represented emotions.

Bhāva: An emotion or psychological state represented or expressed in Indian aesthetics. Bhāvas provide the emotional material from which aesthetic relish arises.
Rasa-sūtra: The Nāṭyaśāstra’s compact formula describing how determinants, expressions, and transient states produce rasa. This formula states the basic process by which performance yields aesthetic relish.
Śṛṅgāra: The rasa of love, attraction, and erotic feeling in classical Indian aesthetics. It exemplifies how a durable emotion becomes an aesthetic relish.
Bharata Muni: The traditionally named author of the Nāṭyaśāstra, the foundational Sanskrit treatise on drama. The rasa-sūtra is attributed to the Nāṭyaśāstra associated with Bharata.
Mimesis: The representation or imitation of actions and life in art. Rasa concerns the audience’s aesthetic experience, not only how art represents action.
Sthāyibhāva: A durable emotional disposition that can develop into a rasa in aesthetic experience. Its transformation into a relishable experience anchors the theory of rasa.
Sādhāraṇīkaraṇa: Aesthetic universalization through which particular emotions become available for shared contemplation. It explains why a represented emotion can be savored beyond the characters’ personal circumstances.
Karuṇa: The rasa of sorrow and compassion in classical Indian aesthetics. Tragedy can transform represented grief into the relishable experience of karuṇa.
Ānandavardhana: A ninth-century Sanskrit literary theorist best known for formulating the theory of poetic suggestion. His account of suggestion helped explain how poetry can evoke rasa indirectly.
Catharsis: A process of emotional clarification or release associated with Aristotle’s account of tragedy. Both address spectators’ responses to drama, but they describe those responses differently.

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