Wednesday, February 17, 2016

Week 5 Reading Diary continued: PDE Mahabharata

PDE Mahabharata by Sister Nivedita (1914), Donald A. Mackenzie (1913), and John Mandeville Macfie (1921).

Queen Kunti and the pandavas are in danger staying at the palace. They have been warned of this so they flee, but not before prince Bhima burns down the guardhouse with Purochana inside. When I was reading this story I thought they were building the escape passage just in case something went wrong. I imagined that they would go on living their lives normally until Purochana lit their palace on fire in the night at which point they would flee using the escape passage. That would be a fun way to rewrite the story. If I wanted to continue using the letters home writing style I could have either queen Kunti or one of the Pandavas write home.

In the forest a female rakshasa falls in love with Bhima. He does not trust her at first but eventually gives in and they get married. Then they have a son together. What if she was just trying to earn his trust so that she could have an opportunity to strike? I could do a story on this where she eventually turns on his family and eats them.

Arjuna falls in love with Subhadra who is to be married to Duryodhana. At Krishna’s advice Arjuna abducts Subhadra and takes her away. This almost caused a lot of controversy, but Krishna was able to convince her father to accept what has happened and welcome Arjuna into the family. In the reading I have done, not many kings have let someone convince them that there is a better way than their own, especially not their daughters. If king Balarama were a more stubborn man, this would have turned into a great chase and battle which would be a fun story to tell.

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