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.
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.
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| Arjuna humbles Ravana. Wikimedia |
I also thought it was interesting to see how different Narayan’s and Buck’s versions are of the Ramayana! Rama exiling Sita was very strange to me as well! They are my favorite characters and I was sad to see that Rama was so quick to send Sita away when people began questioning her innocence and his decision to let her stay.
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