lover’s appearance was that of an aristocratic youth and the ladies whom he loved had the bearing of elegant princesses.  Yet often the scene of their encounters was a forest thick with flowering trees.  His companions were cowherds and the objects of his love were not the ladies of a court but cowgirls.  Other activities betrayed the same lowly sphere.  In certain pictures, he was shown eating with cowherds, sharing in their sports, grazing the cattle and himself milking cows.  That such a lover should dominate the paintings was perplexing in the extreme and just as cultured Indians would be baffled by Italian and Flemish painting unless they already knew the life of Christ, it was clear that part, even the majority, of these pictures would remain obscure unless the character of their central figure was first explained.  One further point remained.  In many cases, the pictures were not intended to be viewed in isolation but were illustrations of a text.  Many were inscribed with Sanskrit or Hindi verses and in each case there was an intimate connection between the content of the picture and the poem’s subject.  To understand the pictures, therefore, some acquaintance with these texts was necessary for only in this way could the identity and role of the blue-skinned lover be appreciated.  He was, in fact, Krishna—­an incarnation of God—­and in his worship some of the deepest requirements of the Indian spirit found ecstatic release.

The purpose of this book is to throw some light on Indian painting by presenting the story of Krishna in the clearest possible terms.  It might be supposed that, of all Indian gods, Krishna was already the one best known to the West and therefore, perhaps, the one least requiring explanation.  Among modern poets, Sacheverell Sitwell devotes a whole poem in Canons of Giant Art to describing Krishna’s effect.

  Rain falls and ceases, all the forest trembles: 
  Mystery walks the woods once more,
  We hear a flute. 
  It moves on earth, it is the god who plays
  With the flute to his lips and music in his breath: 
  The god is Krishna in his lovely youth.

Louis MacNeice in Ten Burnt Offerings describes a much-loved cat,

  Fluid as Krishna chasing the milkmaids.

And the same Krishna, flute player and lover of milkmaids, is familiar to British audiences from the dancing of Ram Gopal.  Yet side by side with this magnetic figure, a second, strangely different Krishna is also known.  This second Krishna is the preacher of the Bhagavad Gita, the great sermon delivered on the battle-field of Kurukshetra.  It is a cardinal document of Indian ethics, and consoled Mahatma Gandhi during his work for Indian independence.  It has for many years been known in the West but has recently attracted fresh attention through a modern translation by Christopher Isherwood and Swami Prabhavananda.  This Krishna of the Gita is clearly quite different