Books that changed my life - Baron in the Trees - Il Barone Rampante - On rasa and bhāva

Italo Calvino’s Il Barone Rampante / Baron in the Trees is one of my favourite ever books. It was one of the texts/aesthetic experiences/works of art that gave me an undeniable experience of what is known in Sanskṛt as rasa - the flavour that art can invoke and evoke. When I first read it, in my second year of studying Italian, I also read the English translation. Curiously, my favourite episodes were different in the original and in the translation. Of course, any translation, however masterful ,will never be able to represent all of the same nuance of the original. Still, even if you don’t read Italian, I highly recommend Baron in the Trees.In this episode, I talk a little about the theory of rasa and bhāva, principles elaborated in Bharata’s Nāṭyaśāstra and Abhinavagupta’s Abhinavabharati which have rich application in yoga practice.Sign up for my newsletter via the form at the foot of any page on my website to hear about upcoming courses and the membership in which we explore yoga texts, stories and principles in depth and in living relation to our lives today. www.jamesboagyoga.com