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. 

Week 3: Threatening the Sea (Storytelling)

So, let me tell you about my one encounter with the great and powerful Rama.  At first, when I heard Rama was coming to cross my sea, I was so excited to meet him. I would keep my waves calm as he sailed over. I assumed he brought ships for his army to take across the sea.

Little did I know, he had no ship and was in a terrible mood. I mean, I understand that losing Sita upset him. Also, he had been fasting for a couple days so he was probably very hungry. But it was impossible to have a normal conversation with him.

So, he summoned me, Varuna, the god of the sea between his shore and Lanka. I appeared to him immediately, excited for the chance to meet Rama and to help him defeat Ravana. I was ready to discuss ideas with Rama when he said, “Make way for my armies.”

For a second I just stared at him as I tried to decide what to say. I mean, he had to put some effort into it. I couldn't just move all this water. So I said to Rama, still trying to be patient and helpful, “I am as much subject to the laws of nature as other elements. What can I do?” Now, I thought Rama would realize his mistake and understand that I did not have unlimited power to help him.

Before I knew what happened, Rama’s face turned red and he began shouting at me. No one ever treated me that poorly in my entire life. His unintelligible shouts and curses cut through air.  I even heard him threaten to shoot me with his arrows and evaporate my water.

I stared at him in shock. What could I possibly do to make my water move for him? Unlike the Red Sea, I couldn’t just part and return to normal at the will of a staff. Moses was such a show off. I had much more water in me than the Red Sea. I also had the fish to consider. They hated being bunched up together. Finally, to stop Rama’s curses and shouts, I tried to find some middle ground. “What if I helped you build a bridge?” I asked. “You could get your army to help. Between all of us, you could cross soon.”

Rama considered this for a moment before nodding, his anger gone as quickly as it came. “So be it,” he said simply before stalking off, shouting orders at his army of monkeys to bring materials for a bridge.

I breathed a sigh of relief as I resumed my normal activity, being careful to keep waves away from where Rama and his army worked. I watched as Rama’s monkey army and woodland animals worked together to make the huge bridge to Lanka.

The stories I heard about Rama’s greatness are undoubtedly true, but I avoided him for the rest of his stay on my shores. Thankfully, everything worked out for all of us. Rama found Sita and I returned to my regular routine.

Before Rama, no one threatened to evaporate my waters, nor anyone since. Hopefully I won’t be in a situation like that again.

Monkeys and Bears build bridge to Lanka. Wikimedia. 

Author's Note: For this story, I changed the point of view to Varuna, the sea god that Rama summons when he is trying to cross to Lanka. Besides the perspective change, I didn't change too much, as I just wanted the opposite perspective of Rama's. I also modernized the language some, although I kept much of the dialogue between Varuna and Rama the same.

In this scene of Ramayana, I thought Rama was being kind of ridiculous. I particularly chose this story because of how Rama acted in the original.

 Everyone who meets Rama is in awe of his greatness and he usually acts quite heroic and good-natured with people who are helping him. However, there are times when he acts very judgmental, rash, and a bit whiny. He almost  seems like a child who is used to continually getting his way, and then when something happens to change that he throws a fit. A tantrum was kind of what I saw from his behavior in this scene from the original story.

The sea god was bound by natural laws and yet Rama threatens him in the hope that he will somehow do the impossible. It's lucky the sea god was not irritated about his encounter with Rama and still agreed to help the hero get across to Lanka to save Sita.

For anyone who isn't familiar with Christianity, the mention of Moses, his staff, and the Red Sea in the story is a reference to a story in the Christian Bible. In the story, to escape with the Jewish slaves from Egypt, Moses parts the waters of the red sea with his staff, allowing them passage.

Bibliography: Narayan, R. K. (1972) The Ramayana. Pg. 132-133.

Week 3: Rama vs. Ravana (Reading Diary B)

I thought the ending of Ramayana by Narayan was good. I was glad that Rama made it back before Bharata kills himself for failing to sit on the throne. It was very lucky that the gods were there to help Rama with the final battle and his return to Ayodhya or else he never would have made it in time. 

I particularly liked the description at the end about Rama on the throne with Lakshmana and Hanuman standing loyally around him. Also I liked that Vibishana pronounced the king of Lanka after the battle. I thought that that was a good touch to end on with at least some future for him after all his family was killed and most of the country now had hope. 

I did not like the part of the story where Rama had Sita jump onto a pyre to prove that she hadn't let Ravana touch her. I thought that was very cruel of Rama and unfair to Sita. If Rama had protected her properly she never would have been taking, and if Ravana had forced himself on her, Sita would not have had much way to fight back as she was being held hostage and Rama took so long to find her and rescue her. While it was a good visual to have the god of fire save Sita and pronounce her pure, I was upset that Rama would be so cruel towards her after the trauma she has survived at the hand of Ravana. 

Sita's Fire Test. Wikimedia

Week 3: Rama and Sugreeva (Reading Diary A)

This third section of Ramayana focused on the new relationship between Rama and the monkey Sugreeva (Sugriva). I had trouble keeping up with the timeline of this section. It seems like it's been at least a year since Sita was taken by Ravana by the time Sugreeva's search parties go out to find her. I didn't quite understand why Rama instructed Sugreeva to wait until after the rainy season to find Sita. While it would be more inconvenient, Sita being held captive by Ravana and forced to do who knows what for months on end while Rama waits out the rain.

My favorite part of this section was Lakshmana storming into Kiskinda to confront Sugreeva, Angada, and Hanuman. Both Lakshmana's and Rama's anger was pretty intense and the monkey's in Kiskinda could see that. The fear of everyone was almost comical at one man approaching the city, although when he knocks down the barricaded gates, I'm sure that would have been terrifying. It was also funny how instead of Angada going to meet Lakshmana, he runs to his mother and she, with a group of other women, surround Lakshmana until they can calm him and tell him what happened.

Lakshmana confronts Sugriva. Wikimedia

One other thing I wondered about this section was Sugreeva's relationship with Vali. In this epic, what people say is usually the truth, unless the narrator points out that they are lying, as they did with Soorpanaka last section. But it seemed weird to me that Rama would just take Sugreeva's word, who is a complete stranger to him, as to what happened between him and his brother. When Vali and Rama were monologue-ing before Vali's death, I expected Vali to tell a different side of the story that would make Rama question his quick loyalty to Sugreeva.