Métalepse narrative à l'indienne
Dans quel contexte est contée l'histoire de Nala

“Not only does the outer framestory motivate the inner sub-story; the inner story illuminates the outer as well.”

ramanujan_thinking.pdf — Attipat K. Ramanujan, Is there an Indian way of thinking? An informal essay, in McKim Marriott, Ed., India Through Hindu Categories, New Delhi: Sage, 1990, pp. 42-58. (Repr. in Collected Essays.)

p. 48

No Indian text comes without a context, a frame, till the 19th century. Works are framed by phalasruti verses—these verses tell the reader, reciter or listener all the good that will result from his act of reading, reciting or listening. They relate the text, of whatever antiquity, to the present reader—that is, they contextualise it. An extreme case is that of the Nâdisâstra, which offers you your personal history. A friend of mine consulted the Experts about himself and his past and future. After enough rupees had been exchanged, the Experts brought out an old palm-leaf manuscript which, in archaic verses, mentioned his full name, age, birthplace, etc., and said suddenly, ‘At this point, the listener is crossing his legs—he should uncross them.’

Texts may be historically dateless, anonymous; but their contexts, uses, efficacies, are explicit. The Râmâyana and Mahâbhârata open with episodes that tell you why and under what circumstances they were composed. Every such story is encased in a metastory. And within the text, one tale is the context for another within it; not only does the outer framestory motivate the inner sub-story; the inner story illuminates the outer as well. It often acts as a microcosmic replica for the whole text. In the forest when the Pandava brothers are in exile, the eldest, Yuddhisthira, is in the very slough [bourbier] of despondency [désespoir]: he has gambled away a kingdom, and is in /49/exile. In the depth of his despair, a sage visits him and tells him the story of Nala.

As the story of Nala unfolds, we see Nala too gamble away a kingdom, lose his wife, wander in the forest, and finally, win his wager, defeat his brother, reunite with his wife and return to his kingdom. Yuddhisthira, following the full curve of Nala's adventures, sees that he is only halfway through his own, and sees his present in perspective, himself as a story yet to be finished. Very often the Nala story is excerpted and read by itself, but its poignancy is partly in its frame, its meaning for the hearer within the fiction and for the listener of the whole epic. The tale within is context-sensitive—getting its meaning for the tale without, and giving it further meanings.

Scolars have often discussed Indian texts (like the Mahâbhâratha) as if they were loose-leaf files, rag-bag encyclopaedias. Taking the Indian word for text, grantha (derived from the knot that holds the palm leaves together), literally, scholars often posit only an accidental and physical unity. We need to attend to the context-sensitive designs that embed a seeming variety of modes (tale, discourse, poem, etc.) and materials. This manner of constructing the text is in consonance with other designs in the culture. Not unity (in the Aristotelian sense) but coherence, seems to be the end.