Many Mahābhāratas.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Hawley, Nell Shapiro.

Contributor:

Pillai, Sohini Sarah.

Series:

SUNY Series in Hindu Studies

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Mahābhārata--Criticism, interpretation, etc.

Mahābhārata.

Mahābhārata--Influence.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (464 pages)

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

Albany : State University of New York Press, 2021.

Summary:

A major contribution to the study of South Asian literature, offering a landmark view of Mahābhārata studies.

Contents:

Intro

Contents

List of Illustrations

Acknowledgments

Note on Transliteration

Foreword

1 An Introduction to the Literature of the Mahābhārata

Always Wanting These Stories

The Story

The Mahābhārata Genre

A Contextual Introduction to the Essays

Part I: The Manyness of the Sanskrit Mahābhārata

Part II: Sanskrit Mahābhāratas in Poetry and Performance

Part III: Regional and Vernacular Mahābhāratas from Premodern South Asia

Part IV: Mahābhāratas of Modern South Asia

A Story's Cycle of Rebirth

2 Ā Garbhāt: Murderous Rage and Collective Punishment as Thematic Elements in Vyāsa's Mahābhārata

3 The Invention of Irāvān

Introduction

The Texture of Battle Narration in the Bhīṣmaparvan

The Birth of Irāvān

The Death of Irāvān

Irāvān and the Rākṣasas

Conclusion

4 Bodies That Don't Matter: Gender, Body, and Discourse in the Narrative of Sulabhā

5 The Remembered Self: Arjuna as Bṛhannalā in the Pañcarātra

Arjuna as Bṛhannaḍā in the Virāṭaparvan

Arjuna as Bṛhannalā in the Pañcarātra

Arjuna as Śiva, Arjuna as Śleṣa

6 The Lord of Glory and the Lord of Men: Power and Partiality in Māgha's Śiśupālavadha

Kṛṣṇa's Meeting with King Yudhiṣṭhira

Kingship and Kingdom in the Śiśupālavadha

Sharing a Single Throne

7 What Are the Goals of Life? The Vidūṣaka's Interpretation of the Puruṣārthas in Kulaśekhara's Subhadrādhanañjaya

The Puruṣārthas in Kūṭiyāṭṭam: A Counterpoint Narration of the Goals of Life

Day One: Preparations

Day Two: Vivādam-Dispute and Settlement

Day Three: Vinodam and Vañcanam-Amusement and Deceit

Day Four: Aśanam-Feasting

Day Five: Rājaseva-Serving a King.

8 How Do We Remember Śakuntalā? The Mahābhārata and Kālidāsa's Drama on the Contemporary Indian Stage

The Three Śakuntalās of Ensemble 86

Śakuntalā Alone-Rita Ganguly's Tridhara

Igniting Cultural Memory in Kirtana Kumar's Shakuntala Remembered

9 An Old Dharma in a New Age: Duryodhana and the Reframing of Epic Ethics in Ranna's Sāhasabhīmavijaya

Dharmic Tension in the Mahābhārata

Who Killed Droṇa?

Bhīma's Heroic "Triumphs"

Wrestling Gone Wrong: A New Winner in the Kirātārjunīya

Conclusion: A Different Dharma

10 Three Poets, Two Languages, One Translation: The Evolution of the Telugu Mahābhāratamu

Telugu Mahābhāratamu

Nannaya: Early Experimentations in Telugu

Tikkana: Dramatic Flair in Virāṭa's Court

Ĕṛṛana: An Iconic Return to the Sanskrit Mahābhārata

11 The Fate of Kīcaka in Two Jain Apabhramsha Mahābhāratas

Early and Medieval Jain Mahābhāratas: An Overview

Two Jain Mahābhāratas in Apabhramsha

Introducing Kīcaka

Raïdhū's Harivaṃsapurāṇa

Svayambhūdeva's Riṭṭhaṇemicariu

12 The Power-Politics of Desire and Revenge: A Classical Hindi Kīcakavadha Performance at the Tomar Court of Gwalior

A Kauravādi-Vadha: Foregrounding the Martial Mood

The Martial Context: Claiming a K.atriya Status for the Tomars

Questioning Masculine Prowess in the Kīcakavadha

The Performative Tradition of Paṇḍvānī

13 Blessed Beginnings: Invoking Viṣṇu, Kṛṣṇa, and Rāma in Two Regional Mahābhāratas

Layering Kṛṣṇa in Villi's Pāratam

Remembering Rāma in Cauhān's Mahābhārat

Conclusion: Larger Patterns of Retelling the Mahābhārata in Regional Languages

Part IV: Mahābhāratas of Modern South Asia.

14 How to Be Political without Being Polemical: The Debate between Bankimchandra Chattopadhyay and Rabindranath Tagore over the Kṛṣṇacaritra

In Search of Prajñā

Kabitvamay Itihāsa (A Poetic History): Bankim's Ideological Project in the Kṛṣṇacaritra

Aitihāsik Kāvya: Tagore on the Mahābhārata

The Reader's Prajñā

15 The Epic and the Novel: Buddhadev Bose's Modern Reading of the Mahābhārata

On the Contemporaneity Problem

On Buddhadev Bose

On Modern Aesthetic Sensibility

Bose's Reading of the Sanskrit Mahābhārata

Yudhi..hira as the Central Figure

Yudhi..hira as a Hero in Search of the Self

16 Draupadī, Yājñasenī, Pāñcālī, Kṛṣṇā: Representations of an Epic Heroine in Three Novels

A Draupadi Caught in the Chaos of Partition

A Peacebuilding, Postcolonial Draupadī

A "Bluer" and Bolder Draupadī

17 From Excluded to Exceptional: Caste in Contemporary Mahābhāratas

Critique from the Margins

The View from the Forest in Mahasweta Devi's After Kurukshetra

Re-reading Ekalavya in Kiran Nagarkar's Bedtime Story

Conclusion: Writers from the Mahābhārata's Margins?

18 A Long Time Ago in a Galaxy Far, Far Away: The Mahābhārata as Dystopian Future

Episode IV: On the Absent Presence of Indian Science Fiction

Episode V: The Kaurava Empire Trilogy

Episode VI: Ahead to the Future?

Bibliography

List of Contributors

Index.

Notes:

Description based on publisher supplied metadata and other sources.

ISBN:

9781438482422

1438482426

OCLC:

1244625567