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Multilinguality gained a new impetus in North India with the influx of West Asian Muslim communities around the thirteenth century. Over a period of time, it entered everyday life as well as creative and scholarly pursuits. The fifteenth century, in particular, saw unprecedented vitality for literary practice, and the poet-scholar Vidyapati from Mithila was one of the many luminaries of the time.

This volume encompasses an intimate linguistic, literary, and historical study of three of Vidyapati’s major works: a Sanskrit treatise on writing (Likhanval); a celebratory biography in Apabhraa (Krttilat) ; and a collection of mythohistorical tales in Sanskrit (Puruapark). Through this examination, the author reveals a world that is marked by a range of ideas, expertise, literary tropes, ethical regimes, and historical consciousness, drawn eclectically from sources that belong to ‘diverse’ politico-cultural traditions. Using Vidyapati’s narratives, A Political History of Literature illustrates that many ideals extolled in fifteenth century literary cultures were associated with an imperial state—a state that was a century away from coming into being—and testifies that ideas incubate and get actualized in realpolitik only in the long duration.

Contents: Preface. Introduction. I. Contexts: 1. Vidyapati and Mithila. 2. The Literary and the Political in the Fifteenth Century . II. Texts: 3. Writing State and Order. 4. Political Ethics or the Art of Being a Man. 5. Entangled Vines of Glory: Krttilat and Its Many Worlds. Inclusion. Bibliography. Index. Glossary.