Janna (

Kannada Kannada () is a Dravidian language spoken predominantly in the state of Karnataka in southwestern India, and spoken by a minority of the population in all neighbouring states. It has 44 million native speakers, and is additionally a ...

: ಮಹಾಕವಿ ಜನ್ನ) was one of the well-known

poets of the early 13th century who also served in the capacity of a minister and a builder of temples. He graced the court of

Hoysala empire The Hoysala Kingdom was a kingdom originating from the Indian subcontinent that ruled most of what is now Karnataka, India, Karnataka, parts of Tamilnadu and South-Western Telangana between the 11th and the 14th centuries Common Era, CE. The c ...

King

Veera Ballala II Veera Ballala II (reigned 22 July 1173–1220) was the most notable king of the Hoysala Kingdom. His successes against the Yadavas of Devagiri, the Kalachuris of Kalyani, Southern Kalachuris, the Pandya Dynasty, Pandyas of Madurai and t ...

and earned the title ''Kavichakravarthi'' ("Emperor among poets"). His noteworthy writings include ''Yashodhara Charite '' (c.1209) which deals with Jain

tenet Tenet may refer to: Media * ''Tenet'' (film), a 2020 science fiction action-thriller film written and directed by Christopher Nolan ** ''Tenet'' (soundtrack), the soundtrack album to the film * Tenet Media, a right-wing US influencer group alleg ...

s, ''Ananthnatha Purana'' (c.1230) which deals with the teachings of the 14th Jain

tirthankara In Jainism, a ''Tirthankara'' (; ) is a saviour and supreme preacher of the ''Dharma (Jainism), dharma'' (righteous path). The word ''tirthankara'' signifies the founder of a ''Tirtha (Jainism), tirtha'', a fordable passage across ''Saṃsā ...

Anantanatha Anantanatha was the fourteenth Tirthankara of the present age (Avasarpini) of Jainism. According to Jain beliefs, he became a siddha, a liberated soul which has destroyed all of its karma. Biography Anantanatha was the fourteenth Tirthankara ...

and a short piece called ''Anubhava Mukura''. Although all his works are known for the grace and style, ''Yashodhara Charite'' is his ''magnum opus'' and one of the classics of

Kannada literature Kannada literature is the Text corpus, corpus of written forms of the Kannada language, which is spoken mainly in the Indian state of Karnataka and written in the Kannada script. Attestations in literature span one and a half millennia, R.S. ...

.Sastri (1955), pp. 358–359Kamath (2001), p. 133 Janna finds an important place in

, though he is not as famous as

Adikavi Pampa Pampa (), also referred to by the honorific Ādikavi ("First Poet"), was a Kannada-language Jain poet whose works reflected his philosophical beliefs. He was a court poet of Vemulavada Chalukya king Arikesari II, who was a feudatory of the ...

. He came from a family of Kannada writers; Mallikarjuna, the well known anthologist was his brother-in-law and

Kesiraja Kēśirāja, also spelled Keshiraja, was a 13th-century Kannada grammarian, poet and writer. He is particularly known for authoring '' Shabdamanidarpana'', an authoritative work on Kannada grammar. According to Dravidian scholar Sheldon Pollock ...

the grammarian, was his nephew.Nagaraj in Pollock (2003), p. 364 Janna's style essentially belonged to the classical ''marga'' (mainstream) brand of Kannada writers and his works were primarily meant to propagate the Jain philosophy.Shiva Prakash (1997), p. 204

Magnum opus

''Yashodhara Charite'', an epic written in the ''kandapadya'' metre is a unique set of stories in 310 verses dealing with perverted sex and violence and contains cautionary morals on the issue of extreme desires.Nagaraj in Pollock (2003), p. 377 Inspired by the Sanskrit writing of the same name by Vadiraja, the Janna transcreates stories of king Yashodhara and his mother and their passing from one life to the next without attaining ''

moksha ''Moksha'' (; , '), also called ''vimoksha'', ''vimukti'', and ''mukti'', is a term in Jainism, Buddhism, Hinduism, and Sikhism for various forms of emancipation, liberation, '' nirvana'', or release. In its soteriological and eschatologic ...

'' (liberation from cycle of death and rebirth). In one of the stories, the king intends to perform a ritual sacrifice of two young boys to a local deity, Mariamma. Taking pity on the boys, the king releases them and gives up the practice of human sacrifice.Sastri (1955), p. 359E.P. Rice (1921), pp. 43–44 In another story, the poet narrates the infatuation of the king for his friends wife. Having killed his friend, the king abducts the wife who however dies of grief. Overcome by repentance, he burns himself on the funeral pyre of the woman.Sahitya Akademi (1988), p. 1181 The stories of infatuation reaches a peak when Janna narrates the attraction of Amrutamati, the queen, to the ugly

mahout A mahout is an elephant rider, trainer, or keeper. Mahouts were used since antiquity for both civilian and military use. Traditionally, mahouts came from ethnic groups with generations of elephant keeping experience, with a mahout retainin ...

Ashtavakra, who pleases the queen with kicks and whip lashes—a story that has piqued the interest of modern research. To expiate the queen from her sinful act, King Yashodhara takes his mothers advice and decides to perform a symbolic sacrifice of a cock made of flour, to please the gods. But the cock comes to life and crows at its time of death. For committing the sin of violence, Yashodhara and his mother are reborn as animals. After much suffering, they are eventually born as the children of Yashodhara's son in their seventh rebirth. The writing powerfully narrates the consequences of passion gone awry and the terrible suffering it brings in human life.Sahitya Akademi (1992), p. 4629

Other writings

Janna's ''Anubhava Mukhura'' is a treatise on erotics and the science of lovemaking, a topic that was well established as a genre of Kannada literature by his time.Nagaraj in Pollock (2003), p. 375

Notes

References

* * * * * * {{Karnataka topics 13th-century Indian poets History of Karnataka 13th-century Indian Jain writers 13th-century Jain poets Medieval Indian Jain poets Kannada poets Poets from Karnataka Indian male poets