{"product_id":"allama-prabhu-and-the-shaiva-d-r-nagaraj-9798855807295","title":"Allama Prabhu and the Shaiva Imagination","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eEngages with the life and ideas of the twelfth-century Shaiva mystic and philosopher-poet Allama Prabhu.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn his last, profoundly innovative work, D. R. Nagaraj (1954-1998) engages with the twelfth-century Shaiva mystic and philosopher-poet Allama Prabhu, whose enigmatic writings have perplexed many and thus resisted analysis. Nagaraj situates Allama in three intellectual contexts: the medieval philosophical world built around the worship of Shiva; the pan-Indian bhakti tradition; and, most broadly, Indian mystical thought. This framework enables a reconstruction of Allama through the poet's engagement with fellow poet-spiritualists (\u003ci\u003evachanakaras\u003c\/i\u003e) such as Basava, as well as with the Kashmiri Shaiva philosopher Abhinavagupta and the founder of Hindu monasticism Gorakhnath. Nagaraj's close readings of Allama's \u003ci\u003evachanas\u003c\/i\u003e offer a vision of Shaiva bhakti that seems to contradict the erotic and romantic expressive modes of Sringara \u003ci\u003erasa\u003c\/i\u003e while tracing the limits of language for an understanding of the divine. Allama, Nagaraj suggests, is an epistemological iconoclast who expands the horizons of language and thought.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThrough these explorations, Nagaraj decolonizes the standard modes of inquiry and critiques certain settled notions in Indian philosophy, revealing himself as a postcolonial scholar whose \"hermeneutics of suspicion\" leads to a novel understanding of Indian texts and traditions. Unifying literary criticism with critical theory, philosophical inquiry, and the history of ideas, the book's focus on a specific religious tradition-Virashaivism-is never singular, making it as much a work for scholars of Indian spiritualism and religious thought as for those interested in frameworks that transgress Eurocentricism. Translated into English by Kannada philosopher N. S. Gundur, this is a major contribution to studies of Indian philosophy and literature.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAuthor:\u003c\/b\u003e D. R. Nagaraj\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN-13:\u003c\/b\u003e 9798855807295\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublisher:\u003c\/b\u003e State University of New York Press\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eLanguage:\u003c\/b\u003e English\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublished:\u003c\/b\u003e 05\/01\/2026\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePages:\u003c\/b\u003e 436\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eFormat:\u003c\/b\u003e Hardcover\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eWeight:\u003c\/b\u003e 1.66lbs\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eSize:\u003c\/b\u003e 9.00h x 6.00w x 1.13d","brand":"D. R. Nagaraj","offers":[{"title":"Hardcover","offer_id":48460271059199,"sku":"9798855807295","price":140.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0662\/2982\/9887\/files\/img_cfa2831b-f1e4-4782-b38e-9992f03b1648.jpg?v=1777413663","url":"https:\/\/www.whiterainbookhouse.com\/products\/allama-prabhu-and-the-shaiva-d-r-nagaraj-9798855807295","provider":"WR Book House","version":"1.0","type":"link"}