Week 7: A Ghost Took Over My Life (Storytelling)

I stood before a group of cow herders. One sat in a rickety chair, while the others stood in a semi-circle behind him. To my right stood a man who looked identical to me, behind us stood my mother and wife, the two people this man stole from me.

“Neat-Herd King,” I addressed the young man sitting in the chair, “this man has stolen my life and claims to be me. If I tell you what happened, will you decide which of us is the true Brahman and end this madness?”

“I will,” he said. “Please, tell your story.”

Illustration by Warwick Goble from Folk-Tales of Bengal 

And so I began:

Have you ever gone away for a few years and come back to find a ghost living your life? I’m gonna guess you haven’t. Well, I've lived this nightmare and now I want my family back. But let me start from the beginning, just so you know I’m the real Brahman.

I was poor and couldn't support my wife and mother on the money I had. So I decided to travel to a distant land to work and earn enough money for us to live off. I knew I’d be gone for a while and I told my wife and mother this.

Leaving them was the hardest thing I've ever had to do, but I knew that without money we wouldn't survive. So I hugged my mother and kissed my wife and set off on the great journey. I worked for years, saving everything I made. Finally, I knew I had enough money to give my family a comfortable life.

When I returned, I was so excited to see my wife and mother. I couldn't wait to show them the money I had made and buy them new clothes and the best food. But things did not go as I planned. I came back, and there was a man inside the house…a man who looked exactly like me.

I was looking at a living reflection of myself who had lived with my family the years I was away. I was shocked and couldn't understand what happened.

“What are you doing here? This is my house!” I shouted at the man.

He looked me over and smirked, just a little. “No,” he said. “This is my house. This is my wife and this is my mother. I've lived here for years and now you just come here and claim it all for yourself? No. This is my family.”

I stared at the imposter who had taken over my life. After years of hard work, I come to find my life is being lived by someone else. I decided to bring the matter before the King of our kingdom. If anyone could discover the truth and give me my life back it was him.

Of course, the King was just as vexed as I. When I brought the look-alike to court to plead my case, he simply stared between the two of us, not knowing what to do. Finally he said he’d decide tomorrow. And then he said the next day, and then next.

As I was leaving the King’s court one day, a herdsman called me over. He said the Neat-Herd King would decide the case if the real King said it was all right. When I asked the King, he eagerly gave the responsibility over to the cow herder.

*** 

“And now, I am here, pleading my case to you, Neat-Herd King,” I said, watching the Cow Herder King look between the imposter and me.

“Well,” the herder said as he stood from his chair. He grabbed a small bottle from one of the men behind him. “This is what we’ll do. Whoever can get inside this bottle will be the man who keeps the home, wife, and mother.”

I stared at the cow herder incredulously. “What do you mean!?” I shouted. “It’s impossible! Even a herder should know that!”

The imposter jumped at his opportunity. “Of course I can do that,” he said. Before I could blink, the man transformed from my double into a small bug and flew into the bottle.

I was about to despair. I thought this cow herder was going to give this fake my family  for flying in a bottle. But the Neat-Herd King quickly took a cap and sealed the bottle.

“Of course it’s impossible,” the Herder King said, “at least for a real human.” He smiled at me and gestured to my wife and mother. “This is your real son and husband. The other was a ghost who tricked you. It happened to me once before.” The Herder King handed me the bottle, which held the small bug the ghost had transformed into. “He can’t escape as long as you keep the bottle sealed,” the Neat-Herd King said.

I took the bottle from him and nodded. “Thank you. I doubted you, but you are true and clever.” With the bottle in one hand, I rejoined my family who began crying and hugging me. Finally life could go back to normal.

***

Author's Note: My retelling this week is from the Bengal Folktales reading unit. The original story was called The Ghost Brahman.

The first thing I would like to make sure is clear is that in the story, "Neat-Herd King" is the king or leader of Cow Herders.

The was about a man who went to work in a distant land to earn money for his wife, mother, and himself to live comfortably. However, the day he left, a ghost took his form and convinced the wife and mother that he had decided to stay, thus taking over the Brahman's life. The Brahman returns, rich and ready to be home, only to find that someone who looks identical to him is living his life. He tries to make the ghost leave, but the ghost continues to insist he is the real Brahman. The man then asks the King for help but the King is confused and doesn't know what to do, so he continues putting off the decision. Finally, the Brahman asks for the help of the leader of the cow herders, who tricks the ghost into a small vial and seals it. The Brahman then gets his life back with the ghost successfully locked away. 

For my story, I focused on when the Brahman was trying to convince the Neat-Herd King of his identity and the actions of the Herder King afterwards. I thought the way the herder tricked the ghost was clever and I loved that in the end the lowly cow herder was the one to discover the truth and give the Brahman his life back.

I didn't change much in the story. I did add that the Neat-Herd King had dealt with similar ghosts before because I thought that would better explain how he decided to trick the ghost.

Story source:Folk-Tales of Bengal by the Rev. Lal Behari Day, with illustrations by Warwick Goble (1912).

Week 7: Khasi Folktales (Extra Reading Diary)

For the extra half reading, I chose to read Khasi Folktales.

The first story I would like to talk about from this unit is the story of The Goddesses Ka Ngot and Ka Iam. This story reminded me a lot of the story of the race between the tortoise and the hare.

It surprised me when the twins became rivers. While it did say they were goddesses, I wasn't expecting them to become rivers to race. I liked that instead of having something like the tortoise and the hare where each species was naturally fast or slow, they gave each of the girls comparable human traits. Ka Ngot being timid and anxious was great for her being slower and more careful about the path she chose, while Ka Iam was impatient and overly confident and just wanted the most direct path even if she had to struggle through it and in the end it took longer.

I was a little confused about what the part about the sliver necklace had to do with anything, as it didn't seem relevant. It seemed more like an offshoot or side note of the story.

Two Rivers by Albert Bridge. Geograph.

The second story that I want to talk about from the first half of this unit is Hunting the Stag Lamalang. I was really expecting the mother to die in the story instead of the stag and for it to end like Bambi. I thought that the Stag being hunted and dying because he didn't listen to his mother was a good moral, especially for young children who would hear the story of the stag. 

I also liked the ending where the mother deer was so heart broken about the death of her son that the humans around felt her pain and were ashamed at what they did to mourn their own dead. The ending was a great story to explain how and why people now mourn for the dead. 

Week 7: Folktales from Bengal (Reading Diary B)

This week I read the un-textbook unit, Folktales from Bengal.

One of the stories that I thought was very interesting in the second half of this reading unit was The Origin of Rubies. I thought this story was interesting.

There wasn't much of a moral to the story, which was different than many folktales. I kept expecting the spoiled prince to be punished for is lack of listening to his mother or something to happen after he stole the rubies and the woman from Shiva. I was very surprised when nothing happened especially when Shiva woke up from his mediation.

I was also surprised when the young prince married both the beautiful woman who was with Shiva when he was meditating and the princess. The marriage to the princess particularly suprised me because as far as the king knew, the boy was a commoner. But I guess that if you give the king a ton of huge rubies your social status doesn't matter as much.

Illustration by Warwick Goble in Folk-Tales of Bengal by the Rev. Lal Behari Day

My other favorite story from this reading unit was The Bald Wife. Unlike the Origin of Rubies, this story had a clear motive and rewards for being a good person. I thought that it was great that even after the elder wife became young, beautiful, and rich, she continued to be kind to the young wife who had always been horrible to her. I did think that the husband was almost as bad as the younger wife for how he treated the elder.

It was also good to see that the young wife, when she tried to do the same as the elder, wasn't rewarded. Even if the young wife would have listened to the meditating man, she wouldn't have received the blessings of the plants and animals along the path since she didn't help them like the elder wife did. I also liked at the end when the younger wife becomes a maid for the elder and the husband.

Week 7: Folktales from Bengal (Reading Diary A)

This week I read the Folktales from Bengal un-textbook reading. 

One story that I really enjoyed from the first half of this reading unit was the Evil Eye of Sani. In a couple of my anthropology classes over the years, I've learned about myths and legends surrounding different versions the "Evil Eye" in many cultures around the world. Because of that, I thought this story was very interesting.

I liked how it started with the competition between the gods Sani and Lakshmi. The part reminded me a little of the Judgement of Paris in Greek myths. I also thought it was cool how even when it seemed like Sribatsa was just wasting time like with the gold bars from the cow, particularly after his wife was abducted, in the end everything he did worked together to get his wife back, to end the Sani's evil eye on them, and to restore their fortune.

The Goddess, Lakshmi. Wikimedia

While the other stories in this half of the unit were also interesting, my other favorite was the story of the Ghost Brahman. This story was interesting to me because it was unlike any I had heard before. It was unique and entertaining. I couldn't imagine what it was like for the Brahman to go away for years trying to support his family to come back and see someone who looked and acted exactly like him living with his wife and mother. I also loved the end when the neat king tricked the ghost into changing forms so Brahman could have his life and family back. It would have been a huge shock for the mother and wife realizing they hadn't been living with the real Brahman.

I do wish this story had a few more details about the ghost because it almost seemed more like a sorcerer or witch than a ghost in how it was described to transform in order to take over Brahman's life.

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Week 5: Sita's Abduction (Reading Diary B)

This section of Buck's Ramayana was very similar to Narayan's, most likely because this is the section that Narayan went into the most detail during.

My favorite part of this reading was Ravana's encounter with Maricha. I thought that Maricha's character was interesting in Narayan's version, and in Buck's we seemed to go into much more detail with Ravana and Maricha's conversation about Sita and Rama. I like how after Maricha survives the fight with Rama, unlike the other rakshasas, he takes a step back and realizes that he should just walk away from the fighting and live. If other demons had done that, Rama would have had a much easier job and their world would have been pretty peaceful. In this section, Maricha is one of the only people telling Ravana the truth honestly trying to help him. He even tells him that Surpanaka isn't someone who should be trusted and that Ravana would lose everything if he went on this stupid mission.

When Maricha finally agrees to help, after Ravana threatened to kill him, I thought his line "It is better to be killed by the better person" was very interesting. With that statement, it shows that, while Maricha is helping Ravana, he thinks Rama is person who should (and will) win in the end. I understand why he does this, he doesn't want Ravana to kill him, but it would have been interesting if Maricha had warned Rama before he was killed.

Rama stalks the Demon Maricha. Wikimedia

Another section that Buck expanded on was the story that Indra tells Sita about Ravana's curse and how it came to be.  I thought that this story added to the overall narrative, by explaining Ravana's actions towards Sita.

Week 5: Exile before Sita's Abduction (Reading Diary A)

One of the first things in this weeks reading that caught my attention was when Bharawaja blessed the three queens, including Kaikeyi. In Narayan's Ramayana everyone (except for Rama) hated Kaikeyi for a while. People tried to curse her and Bharata was so refused to be near her in the beginning. But in Buck's version, everyone is much quicker to forgive, as seen by Bharawaja blessing her, and then Bharata comforting her. In this version, she also seems to realize at this point that she was wrong to do what she did. I also found it interesting that after blessing Kaikeyi, Bharawaja said that it would be for the best in the end and that Rama would help many people during his exile. I thought that this was a nice touch to Buck's story to give everyone involved more hope than in Narayan's version.

I also like that in Buck's retelling of Ramayana there are more details about people that Rama, Sita, and Lakshmana met during their travels. I thought that the gifts given to Sita by Apsarases were interesting. Through Narayan's tellings and some of Buck's, it seemed that Sita was already the most beautiful woman on Earth, yet Apsarases gave her enchanted jewelry and ornaments which would make her the most beautiful, and stay beautiful forever. While I could see giving Sita gifts to allow her to keep her beauty forever, which is what this seemed to be, it still took me by surprise based on Sita's previous descriptions in Ramayana.

Rama visits Atri. Wikimedia

One thing that I particularly liked about this last section of Buck's Ramayana was that it had the time frame. Throughout Narayan's story, I was trying to keep up with how long Rama had been exiled but it was difficult to follow. I was so happy when I read that at the end of this section, Buck said that Rama had now been exiled 13 years. In Narayan's story, in my mind, Sita was abducted much earlier than that and Rama spent years looking for her, since he seemed to do a lot. But at least in Buck's version, I liked knowing how close they were to the end of the exile. 

The last thing that I wanted to talk about from this section is the differences in Surpanakha's confrontations with Rama and Lakshmana. Until she attacked Sita,  it was interesting because the exchange seemed quite civil and polite. I mean according to Buck, an ugly demon came up to the three, tried to convince first Rama to marry her, then Lakshmana afterwards. Both of them politely declined, saying they were already married. Lakshmana even blessed her and wished her luck with finding a husband. This is very different from Narayan's version where Surpanakha was trying to trick Rama and both he and Lakshmana tried to cast her out before she attacked Sita. I liked Buck's version much more and thought that it was kind of entertaining how they interacted before Surpanakha attacked Sita.

Week 4: The Boy in the Forest (Storytelling)

I watched as Dasaratha slept. His wife, Kausalya, sat nearby. The old king shifted and tensed in his sleep. I knew he was remembering me.  The night that ended with him burning the bodies of my parents and me.

I wished, for his sake, that he didn’t have to go through losing a son. I had seen what it did to my parents. When he killed me, it had been an accident. But Rama’s exile was not one. Kaikeyi’s spite and fear had poisoned her husband’s spirit. He would be dead by morning.

I thought back to that night, so many decades before. When the king was a prince and I was just a child. That night contained many mixed memories for me. Obviously, my death and watching my parents mourn and die was not a happy occasion. However, when Indra welcomed me into the Heaven of Warriors, well that was an amazing. It wasn’t long before my parents joined me, with their eyes and bodies repaired.  I thanked Dasaratha for that every day. He could have left my parents to die slowly, wondering what had become of me. But he was a good man, one who made a mistake but tried to fix it as best he could.

Everything had changed so suddenly that night. It had been a normal day. My mother wanted water before bed. I usually don’t like going out at night, but the sun had just set and the river wasn’t far. I’d taken our water jar, and after kissing my mother and father, I promised to return shortly, I left my home for the last time. After a short walk, I knelt down and dipped the jar into the river. Branches crunched to my left and I began to stand, turning towards the sound. Before I was upright, I saw something flying at me and felt the pain through my chest. Next thing I knew I was lying in the dirt, looking up at the stars.

“Who has killed me!?” I cried out, answered only by silence. Then footsteps began coming towards me. In the moonlight stood the prince, Dasaratha, looking pale and shaking.

He stared for a moment, as his face turned a sickly shade of green and tears filled his eyes. He didn’t speak, but stood, staring at what he had done to me. “Prince Dasaratha, have I wronged you in some way that made you want me dead? My parents will now die too. They are blind and sick, unable to move. They have never hurt anyone. Take out the arrow you have killed me with.” Even as I spoke I could feel my life slipping away.

The prince approached me, leaning down to examine the wound. I couldn’t see it, but I knew it was bad. “If I take it out,” he said slowly, “You will die. I’ll leave it in and go find a doctor.”

He began to stand but I grabbed his wrist with the last of my strength. “I’m not afraid of death. I don’t curse you, it was an accident. But please release me. It’s too painful.” Dasaratha did as I asked and pulled out the arrow.

 Soon I was soaring to heaven, being welcomed by Indra. “Child,” the god said, “You have died a warrior’s death.  Come and rest now.” I watched as the prince found my parents, told them what he’d done and carried them to my body. They saw me in the sky one last time before they died as well.

I knew that Dasaratha’s mistake would cost him dearly. That’s how everything works. You get returned what you give. But as I watch him wake and tell Kausalya my story, it feels unfair that a mistake would be answered by maliciously exiling the son he loved so dearly.

Dasharatha and the Blind Boy's Family. Wikimedia.

Author's Note: I kept the story mostly the same, but changed it to the perspective to that of the boy, watching from heaven as Dasaratha lost Rama and remembered that night in the forest. Besides the point of view change, most of the original story was kept the same, with only some wording differences. I decided to expand beyond just the actual event when Dasaratha accidentally kills the boy to connect it to Rama's exile and Dasaratha's reaction. Because the boy and the parents were so understanding of Dasaratha's mistake, I thought that when the karma came back to Dasaratha, the boy and his parents would be sympathetic to Dasaratha's situation.

One reason I decided to use this story was because I thought the part in the story when Dasaratha sees the boy's soul's path going to heaven and being accepted into the heaven of heroes was a really cool touch to the story. I also chose this story because it is a great example of how karma works in Indian tradition. Lastly, it also explains Dasaratha's behavior after Rama is exiled, which in Naryayan's story, without the inclusion of the sotry of the Boy in the Forest, seemed a little overly dramatic.

Bibiography: Buck, William (1976). Ramayana: King Rama's Way. P. 105-109

Week 4: Rama's Exile (Reading Diary B)

One thing that I liked more about Buck's version of Ramayana as opposed to Narayan's was how they came to decide Rama should be made king. In Narayan's the decision was made secretly and sneakily while making sure Bharata was away, as though to limit Rama's competition. This seemed kind of low to me, especially when you see how Bharata reacts to his mother's schemes, that they should try to push him out of the way before crowning Rama. I liked that in Buck's version, it wasn't because Bharata was away that the king decides to make Rama king, but because of some special astrological occurrence, they decide to crown Rama, saying that it would be better if his brothers were here but it was a unique occurrence that would favor the event.

While Kaikeyi's betrayal of Rama happened much in the same way as in Narayan, because of the servant making her fear for her and Bharata's lives once Rama took the crown, Buck's version portrays Kaikeyi as much more conniving and self-serving. This was very apparent in the story about Kaikeyi trying to convince Dasharatha to teach her the language of animals, something he had sworn to never do. Even after being told that Dasharatha would die immediately after, if he ever told anyone, she still pushed him to teach her, knowing it would be his end.

I couldn't believe that Dasharatha took it as far as he did, by building his own funeral pyre to be burned on after he told Kaikeyi the secret, and she was alright with that, sitting on the funeral pyre, waiting for the secret and her husband to die. If he hadn't heard the animals, she would have let him kill himself to give up his secret knowledge. After that incident, I feel like the smartest thing to do would be to keep the king away from Kaikeyi as much as possible, because she obviously had too much power over him. Having this first incident included in the story, before Kaikeyi makes Dasharatha exile Rama and make Bharata king, made her character much less sympathetic, as obviously she didn't care about the king.

Much of the exile story is very similar to Narayan's, with only a few small differences. I did like the extra stories, like about Kaikeyi from Gahu, I also liked the extra back story behind Dasharatha's death, with the boy he killed in the forest. It seemed much more believable that that would cause him grief than just his son leaving when he would return after his exile.

Dasharatha and the Blind Boy's Family. Wikimedia.

Week 4: Rama/Sita Relationship and Ravana's History (Reading Diary A)

It was really interesting, starting this new version of Ramayana and seeing how differently Buck and Narayan translate the stories. The details they keep in or add can change the story quite a lot.

In the very beginning, when Rama has exiled Sita while she is pregnant with twins seemed so strange to me. So much of the love story of Rama and Sita focuses on how perfect they are together and how they are meant to be. But between exiling his pregnant wife at the beginning of Buck's version, and in Narayan's version after he rescues her, telling her he doesn't trust her and to leave, causing her to jump on pyre, I don't know how his behavior towards her is very romantic or soul mate-ish. Although there are other parts in the stories where they do seem perfect together, there are some sections that just don't seem to fit nicely into the story or reflect very well on Rama's feelings towards Sita. 

(wedding of Rama and Sita)

I loved learning more about Ravana's beginnings, as well as some of the other Rakshasas. They all have very interesting back stories and I like that Buck included more about them than Narayan. One part in particular that stuck out to me about Ravana's back story is when everyone else had given up to him, but the King Kartavirya, who had been bathing when Ravana attacked just started squeezing him with a some of his many arms until Ravana had to be saved by his family. This was a very different version of Ravana's story than we saw in Narayan's tellings where Ravana is usually thought to be all powerful. 

Arjuna humbles Ravana. Wikimedia

Storybook Styles Brainstorm

For my storybook, I am going to focus on Rakshasas from the epics we read. I think I will focus on lesser known rakshasas than like, Ravana, as there will be more options for storytelling.  I will focus on a different rakshasa per story, most likely two from Ramayana and two from Mahabharata. While I haven’t decided for sure which rakshasas I will focus on, I think from Ramayana I will tell a story about Maricha, and maybe Tadaka.

So far my bibliography is:

Narayan, R. K. (1972) The Ramayana.

I've begun looking at the full translation of Ramayana by Valmiki

Wikipedia about Rakshasas and Asuras.

Specific Wikipedia articles about Tadaka and Maricha.

Of the storytelling ideas I had, I like the first and the second the most, so far. 

For my first storytelling option, I had considered doing a Rakshasa Newspaper.  The stories would probably be either included in obituaries , after Rama or the other heroes killed the Rakshasas, or in crime stories, warning of dangerous men, armed with bows and arrows and monkeys, attacking the rakshasa people. 

A second option could be a diary idea. The person who the intro focuses on would find a very old diary in some sealed vase hidden in a temple in India. In that diary, there would be stories about rakshasas, as if the person who wrote it had observed the happenings.  I think this could be interesting because it is different than a lot of stories I’ve seen and it could include the ancient stories, seen through a more modern day context of the person who finds the diary.

Another type of storytelling would be Vishnu telling others his stories from defeating different rakshasas, as Rama and his other avatars, and what he learned since about the rakshasas in his stories. It will be a little bit of a first person narrative, since he remembers the events, but it will also be a little omnipotent, as since he is divine again, he can see and understand the entire story, not just what he saw when he was living as a human. 

Vishnu. Wikimedia

The last storytelling idea I had was to modernize the stories, and make it almost like school yard stories, with Ravana being the leader of a bullying gang of kids, but the stories focusing on the lower ranking members. Rama would be the strong kid who takes on the bullies. The stories would be told by other kids, to one another, about the bullying gang and how Rama defeats them, ridding the school of mean bullies.