This greatest of court epics describes events leading up to but not including the birth of Kumára (also known as Skanda or Karttikéya), the war god destined to defeat the demon Táraka. The gods attempt to deploy Kama, the Indian Cupid, to set the ascetic supreme deity Shiva on fire with love for Uma (also known as Párvati), the daughter of the god of the Himalayan mountain range. Kama’s mission fails and the enraged Shiva turns his flaming third eye on the love god, burning him to ashes. Next Párvati herself turns to intense asceticism in order to win spiritual power and thereby the husband for whom she longs. She succeeds and the climax of the poem is Shiva and Párvati’s marriage and cosmic lovemaking, and Kumára’s divine conception. To win Shiva’s love, Párvati lives outdoors come rain or shine: Excessively heated by twofold fire: by the sun in the sky and by fires fed by fuel, at the end of the hot season drenched with fresh showers she along with the earth gave off rising steam. Pausing a moment on her eyelashes, beating against her lower lip, breaking up in the fall on to the protrusion of her breasts, slithering into the three folds of skin below, the first drops of water eventually reached her navel.

•《云使》是迦梨陀娑最优秀的诗歌作品，也是印度古典诗歌中的瑰宝。诗歌写一个结婚一年的小夜叉被贬谪到偏远的罗摩山上，他不得不与爱妻分离一年。当雨季来临时节，夜叉思念妻子，就托一片缓缓飘向家乡方向的雨云转达自己的遥思。 •他把雨云当作通解人情的知心人，细细向其讲述北去家乡的路线和沿途风光。雨云飘走时，他还想象雨云飘到了他家院子，看到妻子因思念他而神形憔悴。 •这首诗充分体现了印度文学想象丰富、构思奇绝、譬喻绮丽、感情真挚的特点。后人仿做不绝，形成了“信使体”诗歌，如《风使》、《月使》等

Kalidasa's play about the love of King Dusyanta for Sakuntala, a monastic girl, is the supreme work of Sanskrit drama by its greatest poet and playwright (c.4th century CE). Overwhelmingly erotic in tone and in performance, The Recognition of Sakuntala aimed to produce an experience of aesthetic rapture in the audience, comparable to certain types of mystical experience. The pioneering English translation of Sakuntala in 1789 caused a sensation among European composers and writers (including Goethe), and it continues to be performed around the world. This vibrant new verse translation includes the famous version of the story from the Mahabharata, a poetic and dramatic text in its own right and a likely source for Kalidasa. The introduction discusses the play in the aesthetic and cultural context of ancient India.