Literary merits of Panchtantra

Panchtantra is a literary work per excellence. It has the framework that encompasses fable narrative to prove its premise. It is an art of narrative fiction which leaves its mark even on the literary styles of contemporary writers as on Gautam Bhattia’s Panchtantra: A Twenty First Century Parable. The traces of story telling in the similar style are also found in Mahabharata, Ramayana. From the time of Rigveda, storytelling has emerged as a feasible form of knowledge diffusion. Panchtantra is a literary composition because it promotes Dharma, Artha, Kama and Moksha which is the merit of a literary composition. It is another truth that women are kept out of this circle of knowledge.

Literary works according to Indian poetics are known to produce an aesthetic whole. The vitalization of prose with verse as used in Jataka Kathas and Panhctantra also stamps its literary qualities by delighting readers with wonderful fusion of prose and verse in literary style.

Symbolism is an important element of a literary work. The Panchtantra, a collection of fables makes symbolic use of animals as characters in the language suitable to literary and instructive goals. A fable has been a favorable genre of literature. Walter De La Mare observes in Animal Stories that even Plato prefers raconteur to Homer and says that Plato excluded Homer from his Republic and gave Aesop a place of honor, hoping that the young would absorb fables along with their mother's milk ... since one cannot at too early an age acquire a love for wisdom and virtue.

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