Week 2 Reading Diary A: Narayan's Ramayana

(An image of Vishnu found on DeviantArt)

To start off, I think reading Narayan's edition of Ramayana makes the story much easier to understand. I took a glance at the public domain version of the tales and they seemed a bit too much for me. Perhaps it is because I am so unfamiliar with the subject, but I hope to become more comfortable with the Ramayana. Maybe in the future I can look at the public domain version of the stories and be more comfortable with reading those.

That being said, I have enjoyed what I have read so far. Narayan writes really clearly making it easy to understand what is going on. The introduction really prepared me for what was coming up and the list of characters is extremely useful. I love the romanticism that is throughout the stories when Rama meets Sita. I cannot wait to see where that goes. I like that Rama is a human reincarnation of Vishnu. That really captured my interest, too. 

As of right now, my favorite short story within the novel is Thataka's Story. I know it is very early on in the first 50 pages of the book, but I can easily picture the series of events and destruction when reading it. The idea of indulgence seems to stand out the most to me. I can't believe that her sons were quick to seek out the superdemons after "falling" from their position as demigods. As for Rama's role in the story, it's not obvious until the end. I love that as soon as Rama hears the story, he is ready to take Thataka on. I have an idea in my mind for a possible storytelling post that I might try out this week. I must read more of the book to decide if I will write about Thataka, but so far I am leaning that way.

I can't seem to put the book down. I truly do look forward to reading more.