Avadhanaअवधान

Where this comes from

In an ashtavadhana, one person faces eight questioners at the same time. Each gives a different challenge: make a verse in a strict metre, avoid letters that are suddenly not allowed, turn a silly line into a good one, or use four given words. One of the eight has only one job: to interrupt. The questioners take turns over four rounds. At the end, the avadhani recites every finished verse from memory, with no notes. It takes two to three hours. A shatavadhana does the same with a hundred questioners.

Avadhana is known from around the twelfth century, and it grew from much older ways of learning the Vedas by heart. It is the highest form of two of the sixty-four kalas: dharana matrika, the art of memory, and pratimala, the art of answering a verse with a verse.

वर्ण Thread one: the letters

A list to keep in order, the same skill a chanter uses to keep a verse exact.

घण्टा Thread two: the bells

Ghantanadam, counting bells rung at random moments in a performance, is a real avadhana task. You must keep the count safe while everything else goes on.

∪ — The line of marks

In Sanskrit verse, every syllable is laghu (∪, light) or guru (—, heavy). The row of marks under the questioners uses the same signs: what is still to come is light, what is already given is heavy, like a verse filling in as it is spoken.

अप्रस्तुत प्रसङ्ग The interruption

The one who interrupts. Answering costs nothing by itself. The cost is whatever you were holding in mind when the question came.

An honest note. With practice you will get better at this game, and you will see how much of your attention slips away each time you switch. It will not make you more intelligent in general, and a quick mind is not the same as a clear mind. Use it as a mirror, not a cure.