| Figures and Tables | p. xiii |
| Acknowledgments | p. xv |
| A Note on Sanskrit Transliteration | p. xvii |
| Introduction | p. 1 |
| Śle&sbdot;a: A Brief Overview of the Mechanisms of Simultaneity | p. 3 |
| The Many Manifestations of Śle&sbdot;a: A Brief Sketch | p. 6 |
| What (Little) Is Known About Śle&sbdot;a | p. 7 |
| The Anti-Śle&sbdot;a Bias: Romanticism, Orientalism, Nationalism | p. 9 |
| Is Śle&sbdot;a “Natural” to Sanskrit? | p. 13 |
| Toward a History and Theory of Śle&sbdot;a | p. 17 |
| Experimenting With Śle&sbdot;a In Subandhu's Prose Lab | p. 20 |
| The Birth of a New Kind of Literature | p. 20 |
| The Paintbrush of Imagination: Plot and Description in the V&abar;savadatt&abar; | p. 25 |
| Amplifying the World: Subandhu's Alliterative Compounds | p. 33 |
| Showcasing Śle&sbdot;a: The Opening Lines of the V&abar;savadatt&abar; | p. 38 |
| Teasing the Convention: The Targets of Subandhu's Śle&sbdot;a | p. 44 |
| B&abar;$$$a's Laughter and the Response to Subandhu | p. 50 |
| Conclusion | p. 55 |
| The Disguise of Language: Śle&sbdot;a Enters The Plot | p. 57 |
| K&ibar;cakavadha (Killing K&ibar;caka) by N&ibar;tivarman | p. 58 |
| The Elephant in the (Assembly) Room: N&ibar;tivarman's Buildup | p. 60 |
| From Smoldering to Eruption: Draupad&ibar;'s Śle&sbdot;a and Its Implications | p. 64 |
| Embracing the Subject: Śle&sbdot;a and Selfing | p. 71 |
| Embracing Twin Episodes: Śle&sbdot;a and the Refinement of the Epic | p. 75 |
| Flowers and Arrows, Milk and Water: Responses to N&ibar;tivarman's Śle&sbdot;a | p. 78 |
| Sarasvat&ibar;'s Śle&sbdot;a: Disguise and Identity in Śr&ibar;har&sbdot;a's Nai&sbdot;adhacarita | p. 82 |
| Conclusion | p. 88 |
| Aiming at two Targets: The Early Attempts | p. 91 |
| The Mahabalipuram Relief as a Visual Śle&sbdot;a | p. 92 |
| Da&nbdot; &dbdot;in: A Lost Work and Its Relic | p. 99 |
| Dhanañjaya: The Poet of Two Targets | p. 102 |
| Lineages Ornamented and Tainted: On Śle&sbdot;a's Contrastive Capacities | p. 106 |
| What Gets Conarrated? Dhanañjaya's Matching Scheme | p. 112 |
| Śle&sbdot;a and the Aesthetics of Simultaneity | p. 115 |
| Why Conarrate the Epics? | p. 119 |
| Bringing The Ganges to The Ocean: Kavir&abar;ja and The Apex of Bitextuality | p. 122 |
| The Boom of a Śle&sbdot;a Movement | p. 123 |
| The Bitextual Movement and the Lexicographical Boom | p. 128 |
| Sanskrit Bitextuality in a Vernacular World | p. 132 |
| Kavir&abar;ja's Matching of the Sanskrit Epics | p. 140 |
| Amplifying Epic Echoes | p. 148 |
| Conclusion | p. 153 |
| Śle&sbdot;a as Reading Practice | p. 155 |
| The Imagined Śle&sbdot;a Reader: Representations and Instructions | p. 156 |
| Things That Can Go Wrong with Śle&sbdot;a: The Theoreticians' Warning | p. 159 |
| Seeing Shapes in Clouds: Different Readings of Meghad&ubar;ta 1.14 | p. 169 |
| Old Texts, New Reading Methods: The Commentaries on Subandhu | p. 176 |
| Śle&sbdot;a and Allegory in the Commentaries on the Epic | p. 181 |
| Double-Bodied Poet, Double-Bodied Poem: Ravicandra's Reading of Amaru | p. 183 |
| The Śle&sbdot;a Paradox | p. 192 |
| Theories of, Śle&sbdot;a In Sanskrit Poetics | p. 195 |
| Theorizing Ornaments: An Overview of Alamk&abar;raś&abar;stra | p. 196 |
| Śle&sbdot;a as a Theoretical Problem | p. 203 |
| Speaking Crookedly and Speaking in Puns: Śle&sbdot;a's Role in Da&nbdot; &dbdot;in's Poetics | p. 214 |
| Da&nbdot; &dbdot;in's Discovery in Its Context | p. 226 |
| Toward A Theory of Śle&sbdot;a | p. 231 |
| A Concise History of the Experiments with Śle&sbdot;a | p. 231 |
| Śle&sbdot;a as a Literary Movement | p. 234 |
| Śle&sbdot;a and Sheer Virtuosity | p. 239 |
| Śle&sbdot;a and the Registers of the Self | p. 242 |
| Śle&sbdot;a and the Refinement of the Epic | p. 246 |
| Playing with the Convention: Śle&sbdot;a and Deep Intertextuality | p. 250 |
| Śle&sbdot;a and K&abar;vya's Subversive Edge | p. 254 |
| Extreme Poetry and Middle-Ground Theory: The Challenges Posed by Śle&sbdot;a | p. 257 |
| Bitextual and Multitextual Works in Sanskrit | p. 267 |
| Bitextual and Multitextual Works in Telugu | p. 272 |
| Notes | p. 277 |
| References | p. 315 |
| Index | p. 331 |
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