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The work of "Abhinavagupta : An Historical and Philosophical Study", is an important contribution to scholarship. It provides an account of well-known, but little-studied, philosophical system, known under the several names of 'Siva' 'Trika' 'Pratyabhijna' and others. The basic Sutras expounding the system are by Siva himself, followed by Parasurama Gaudapada and others: but like Sankaracarya in the realm of Vedanta whose basis lay in the Upanisads, the person who made the system intelligible was the great Abhinava Gupta who hails, like so many writers of the period, from Kashmir. He is a voluminous writer on several subjects--on Dramaturgy, on Rhetoric, on the Philosophy of Poetry and on Philosophy. But whatever he wrote, not only on philosophy but also on poetry and poetics--in all there runs the under-current of spirituality culminating in that 'Brahmasvada' the idea of which he has made so popular.
The book is divided into two parts, historical and philosophical. The former includes a chapter on the life of Abhinava. Its essential purpose is to show what light a careful study of Abhinava s work throws on two important branches of Sanskrit literature namely, Saiva philosophy and poetics.
Table of Contents:
Introduction.
List of abbreviations.
I. Historical:
1. Life of Abhinavagupta.
2. His works.
3. Paryanta Pangasika.
4. Ghatakarpara Kulaka Vivrti.
5. Historical background of his thought.
6. His importance and influence.
II. Philosophical:
1. Preliminary.
2. Abhasavada or "Realistic Idealism".
3. The categories of the Abhasavada.
4. Abhasavada as the basis of the Pratyabhijna Theory of Knowledge: Preliminaries and presuppositions.
5. The theories of effectability, causality and Karma.
6. The Krama System.
7. The Kula System.
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