Yudhishtar and Draupadi
Yudhishtar and Draupadi

Author: Pavan K. Varma

Publisher:

Published: 1996

Total Pages: 120

ISBN-13:

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Yudhishtar and Draupadi is a long poem in rhymed sonnets based on one of the most important episodes in the Mahabharata. In it, Pavan Varma gives us a new and challenging interpretation of the encounter between the Pandavas and the Yaksha of the Poisoned Pool. During their years of exile, the Pandavas happen upon a pool in the Dvaitvana forest. They thirst for the water, but its guardian will not allow them to drink until they have answered his questions. Four of the brothers die at the hands of the Yaksha after failing to solve the riddles, and then it is Yudhishtarýs turn. The narrative of Yudhishtar and Draupadi begins with the eldest Pandava facing the Yaksha. Determined to bring his brothers back to life, and protect the beautiful Draupadi, the eldest Pandava draws upon his fabled diplomacy and wisdom to answer every one of the Yakshaýs questions faultlessly. As he does so, the reader is given rare and beautifully couched insights into some of the most fundamental questions of life, love, death and benediction. Pavan Varma also uses the episode to look into the uneasy relationship between Yushishtar, and the alluring Draupadi. His austerity and straightforwardness come in the way of his passion for Draupadi, who loves Arjun above everyone else. The complex interplay between the two gives the poet the opportunity to meditate on key apsects of men and women in love.

Yudhisthir and Draupadi
Yudhisthir and Draupadi

Author: Pavan K Varma

Publisher: Penguin UK

Published: 2012-11-15

Total Pages: 177

ISBN-13: 8184757271

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IN THE FOREST, IN THE STILLNESS OF HTE MORNING, YUDHISHTAR, CUSTODIAN OF MORALITY, OBLIVIOUS TO SCALE OR BALANCE, UNTHINKING, MADE LOVE TO THIS WOMAN, HIS WIFE DRAUPADI. A long poem in rhymed sonnets, Yudhishtar and Draupadi is and imaginative retelling of the encounter between the Pandavas and the Yaksha of the pool, which finds Yudhishtar, the eldest Pandava, answering fundamental philosophical questions about existence and the lives of his brothers hang in the balance. Unknown to him, also at stake is his relationship with Draupadi, who is still furious with him for having wagered her at the game of dice with Kauravas (‘he hadn’t won her; she wasn’t his to lose’). This marvellous poetic interpretation of a key episode from the Mahabharata has now been translated by renowned poet-lyricist Gulzar, and is re-published in a bilingual edition.

The Difficulty of Being Good
The Difficulty of Being Good

Author: Gurcharan Das

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2010-10-04

Total Pages: 487

ISBN-13: 0199779600

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Why should we be good? How should we be good? And how might we more deeply understand the moral and ethical failings--splashed across today's headlines--that have not only destroyed individual lives but caused widespread calamity as well, bringing communities, nations, and indeed the global economy to the brink of collapse? In The Difficulty of Being Good, Gurcharan Das seeks answers to these questions in an unlikely source: the 2,000 year-old Sanskrit epic, Mahabharata. A sprawling, witty, ironic, and delightful poem, the Mahabharata is obsessed with the elusive notion of dharma--in essence, doing the right thing. When a hero does something wrong in a Greek epic, he wastes little time on self-reflection; when a hero falters in the Mahabharata, the action stops and everyone weighs in with a different and often contradictory take on dharma. Each major character in the epic embodies a significant moral failing or virtue, and their struggles mirror with uncanny precision our own familiar emotions of anxiety, courage, despair, remorse, envy, compassion, vengefulness, and duty. Das explores the Mahabharata from many perspectives and compares the successes and failures of the poem's characters to those of contemporary individuals, many of them highly visible players in the world of economics, business, and politics. In every case, he finds striking parallels that carry lessons for everyone faced with ethical and moral dilemmas in today's complex world. Written with the flair and seemingly effortless erudition that have made Gurcharan Das a bestselling author around the world--and enlivened by Das's forthright discussion of his own personal search for a more meaningful life--The Difficulty of Being Good shines the light of an ancient poem on the most challenging moral ambiguities of modern life.

Anant Shesha: The Divine Residue
Anant Shesha: The Divine Residue

Author: Bhoj Chander Thakur

Publisher: Notion Press

Published: 2022-11-12

Total Pages: 243

ISBN-13:

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By writing this book, the author wishes to share his perspective on Reality, the Cosmos, Life, Birth, Death, Rebirth, Transmigration, Divinity, the Karmic cycle, Moksha, Nirvana based on knowledge gathered from experience, Hindu scriptures and customs, Vedic and Puranic stories, the institution of deities, religious rituals and practices, Science and the world at large. In this book, the author has made an effort to trace the rationale behind Hindu myths, Deities, Rituals, and Beliefs. The author draws moral courage and strength to write this book from the institution of Devi/Devta, which forms an integral part of the social fabric of Pahari culture (culture of the people living in the hills) widely spread in the Western Himalayas, especially Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand. The book’s premise for the plurality of Hindu deities may, in part, be traced to this Devi/Devta culture. The author earnestly believes that the book would make interesting and informative reading, as it presents a perspective that is apparently at variance with some of the popular notions of Reality and Divinity. It is not a commentary or critique on any religious philosophy, beliefs, or scientific discoveries/theories, though reference to them has been liberally made. The author hopes that his perspective would help kindle the imagination and curiosity of the reader to explore the vast and enigmatic Reality/Cosmos at a personal level and find his/her answers to the aforesaid metaphysical matters.

Literary Location and Dislocation of Myth in the Post/Colonial Anglophone World
Literary Location and Dislocation of Myth in the Post/Colonial Anglophone World

Author:

Publisher: BRILL

Published: 2017-11-01

Total Pages: 274

ISBN-13: 9004361405

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The English-speaking world today is so diverse that readers need a gateway to its many postcolonial narratives and art forms. This collection of essays examines this diver¬sity and what brings so many different cul¬tures together. Whether Indian, Canadian, Australasian or Zimbabwean, the stories dis¬cussed focus on how artists render experi¬ences of separation, belonging, and loss. The histories and transformations postcolonial countries have gone through have given rise to a wide range of myths that retrace their birth, evolution, and decline. Myths have enabled ethnic communities to live together; the first section of this collection dwells on stories, which can be both inclusive and exclusive, under the aegis of ‘nation’. While certain essays revisit and retell the crucial role women have played in mythical texts like the Mahābhārata, others discuss how settler colonies return to and re-appro¬priate a past in order to define themselves in the present. Crises, clashes, and conflicts, which are at the heart of the second section of this book, entail myths of historical and cultural dislocation. They appear as breaks in time that call for reconstruction and redefini¬tion, a chief instance being the trauma of slavery, with its deep geographical and cul¬tural dislocations. However, the crises that have deprived entire communities of their homeland and their identity are followed by moments of remembrance, reconciliation, and rebuilding. As the term ‘postcolonial’ sug¬gests, the formerly colonized people seek to revisit and re-investigate the impact of colo¬nization before committing it to collective memory. In a more specifically literary sec¬tion, texts are read as mythopoeia, fore¬grounding the aesthetic and poetic issues in colonial and postcolonial poems and novels. The texts explored here study in different ways the process of mytho¬logization through images of location and dislocation. The editors of this collection hope that readers worldwide will enjoy reading about the myths that have shaped and continue to shape postcolonial communities and nations. CONTRIBUTORS Elara Bertho, Dúnlaith Bird, Marie–Christine Blin, Jaine Chemmachery, André Dodeman, Biljana Đorić Francuski, Frédéric Dumas, Daniel Karlin, Sabine Lauret–Taft, Anne Le Guellec–Minel, Élodie Raimbault, Winfried Siemerling, Laura Singeot, Françoise Storey, Jeff Storey, Christine Vandamme

The Mahabharata
The Mahabharata

Author:

Publisher: Penguin Books India

Published: 2010

Total Pages: 624

ISBN-13: 0143100165

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The Mahabharata is one of the greatest stories ever told. Though the basic plot is widely known, there is much more to the epic than the dispute between Kouravas and Pandavas that led to the battle in Kurukshetra. It has innumerable sub-plots that accommodate fascinating meanderings and digressions, and it has rarely been translated in full, given its formidable length of 80,000 shlokas or couplets. This magnificent 10- volume unabridged translation of the epic is based on the Critical Edition compiled at the Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute. The fourth volume of the Mahabharata includes Virata Parva and almost all of Udyoga Parva. It describes the Pandavas thirteenth year of exile which they spend in disguise in King Virata s court. When, during their stay, the Kouravas and Trigartas invade Matsya to rob Virata of his cattle, the Pandavas defeat them in battle. With the period of banishment over, the Pandavas ask to be returned their share of the kingdom. This is refused and Udyoga Parva recounts the preparations for the inevitable war. Every conceivable human emotion figures in the Mahabharata, the reason why the epic continues to hold sway over our imagination. In this lucid, nuanced and confident translation, Bibek Debroy makes the Mahabharata marvellously accessible to contemporary readers.

The Mahabharata
The Mahabharata

Author:

Publisher: Penguin UK

Published: 2015-06-01

Total Pages: 797

ISBN-13: 8184759444

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The Greatest Story Ever Told Dispute over land and kingdom may lie at the heart of this story of war between cousins—the Pandavas and the Kouravas—but the Mahabharata is about conflicts of dharma. These conflicts are immense and various, singular and commonplace. Throughout the epic, characters face them with no clear indications of what is right and what is wrong; there are no absolute answers. Thus every possible human emotion features in the Mahabharata, the reason the epic continues to hold sway over our imagination. In this superb and widely acclaimed translation of the complete Mahabharata, Bibek Debroy takes us on a great journey with incredible ease.