{"product_id":"the-ramayana-isbn-9780143039679","title":"The Ramayana","description":"\u003cb\u003eThe greatest Indian epic, one of the world's supreme masterpieces of storytelling\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eA Penguin Classic\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e A sweeping tale of abduction, battle, and courtship played out in a universe of deities and demons, \u003ci\u003eThe Ramayana\u003c\/i\u003e is familiar to virtually every Indian. Although the Sanskrit original was composed by Valmiki around the fourth century BC, poets have produced countless versions in different languages. Here, drawing on the work of an eleventh-century poet called Kamban, Narayan employs the skills of a master novelist to re-create the excitement he found in the original. A luminous saga made accessible to new generations of readers, \u003ci\u003eThe Ramayana\u003c\/i\u003e can be enjoyed for its spiritual wisdom, or as a thrilling tale of ancient conflict.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFor more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.\u003cb\u003eR. K. Narayan\u003c\/b\u003e (1906–2001), born and educated in India, was the author of fourteen novels, numerous short stories and essays, a memoir, and three retold myths. His work, championed by Graham Greene, who became a close friend, was often compared to that of Dickens, Chekhov, Faulkner, and Flannery O'Connor, among others.\u003cp\u003eTable of Contents\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAbout the Author\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eTitle Page\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eCopyright Page\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIntroduction\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eDedication\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eChapter 1 - RAMA’S INITIATION\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eChapter 2 - THE WEDDING\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eChapter 3 - TWO PROMISES REVIVED\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eChapter 4 - ENCOUNTERS IN EXILE\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eChapter 5 - THE GRAND TORMENTOR\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eChapter 6 - VALI\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eChapter 7 - WHEN THE RAINS CEASE\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eChapter 8 - MEMENTO FROM RAMA\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eChapter 9 - RAVANA IN COUNCIL\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eChapter 10 - ACROSS THE OCEAN\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eChapter 11 - THE SIEGE OF LANKA\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eChapter 12 - RAMA AND RAVANA IN BATTLE\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eChapter 13 - INTERLUDE\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eChapter 14 - THE CORONATION\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eEpilogue\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eGlossary\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eTHE RAMAYANA\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eR. K. NARAYAN was born on October 10, 1906, in Madras, South India, and educated there and at Maharaja’s College in Mysore. His first novel, \u003ci\u003eSwami and Friends\u003c\/i\u003e (1935), and its successor, \u003ci\u003eThe Bachelor of Arts\u003c\/i\u003e (1937), are both set in the fictional territory of Malgudi, of which John Updike wrote, “Few writers since Dickens can match the effect of colorful teeming that Narayan’s fictional city of Malgudi conveys; its population is as sharply chiseled as a temple frieze, and as endless, with always, one feels, more characters round the corner.” Narayan wrote many more novels set in Malgudi, including \u003ci\u003eThe English Teacher\u003c\/i\u003e (1945), \u003ci\u003eThe Financial Expert\u003c\/i\u003e (1952), and \u003ci\u003eThe Guide\u003c\/i\u003e (1958), which won him the Sahitya Akademi (India’s National Academy of Letters) Award, his country’s highest honor. His collections of short fiction include \u003ci\u003eA Horse and Two Goats\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eMalgudi Days\u003c\/i\u003e, and \u003ci\u003eUnder the Banyan Tree\u003c\/i\u003e. Graham Greene, Narayan’s friend and literary champion, said, “He has offered me a second home. Without him I could never have known what it is like to be Indian.” Narayan’s fiction earned him comparisons to the work of writers including Anton Chekhov, William Faulkner, O. Henry, and Flannery O’Connor.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eNarayan also published travel books, volumes of essays, the memoir \u003ci\u003eMy Days\u003c\/i\u003e, and the retold legends \u003ci\u003eGods, Demons, and Others\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eThe Ramayana,\u003c\/i\u003e and \u003ci\u003eThe Mahabharata\u003c\/i\u003e. In 1980 he was awarded the A. C. Benson Medal by the Royal Society of Literature, and in 1981 he was made an Honorary Member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters. In 1989 he was made a member of the Rajya Sabha, the nonelective House of Parliament in India.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eR. K. Narayan died in Madras on May 13, 2001.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003cbr\u003ePANKAJ MISHRA is the author of \u003ci\u003eThe Romantics,\u003c\/i\u003e winner of the  \u003ci\u003eLos Angeles Times\u003c\/i\u003e’s Art Seidenbaum Award for First Fiction, \u003ci\u003eAn End to Suffering: The Buddha in the World\u003c\/i\u003e, and \u003ci\u003eTempations of the West: How to be Modern in India, Pakistan, Tibet, and Beyond\u003c\/i\u003e . He is a frequent contributor to the \u003ci\u003eNew York Times Book Review,\u003c\/i\u003e the \u003ci\u003eNew York Review of Books,\u003c\/i\u003e and the \u003ci\u003eGuardian\u003c\/i\u003e.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003ePENGUIN BOOKS \u003cbr\u003ePublished by the Penguin Group \u003cbr\u003ePenguin Group (USA) Inc., 375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, U.S.A. \u003cbr\u003ePenguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto, \u003cbr\u003eOntario, Canada M4P 2Y3 (a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.) \u003cbr\u003ePenguin Books Ltd, 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England \u003cbr\u003ePenguin Ireland, 25 St Stephen’s Green, Dublin 2, Ireland (a division of Penguin Books Ltd) \u003cbr\u003ePenguin Group (Australia), 250 Camberwell Road, Camberwell, \u003cbr\u003eVictoria 3124, Australia (a division of Pearson Australia Group Pty Ltd) \u003cbr\u003ePenguin Books India Pvt Ltd, 11 Community Centre, Panchsheel Park, New Delhi - 110 017, India \u003cbr\u003ePenguin Group (NZ), cnr Airborne and Rosedale Roads, Albany, \u003cbr\u003eAuckland 1310, New Zealand (a division of Pearson New Zealand Ltd) \u003cbr\u003ePenguin Books (South Africa) (Pty) Ltd, 24 Sturdee Avenue, \u003cbr\u003eRosebank, Johannesburg 2196, South Africa\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003cbr\u003ePenguin Books Ltd, Registered Offices: \u003cbr\u003e80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003cbr\u003eFirst published in the United States of America by The Viking Press 1972 \u003cbr\u003eFirst published in Great Britain by Chatto \u0026amp; Windus 1973 \u003cbr\u003ePublished in Penguin Books (U.S.A.) 1977 \u003cbr\u003ePublished in Penguin Books (U.K) 1977 \u003cbr\u003eThis edition with an introduction by Pankaj Mishra published in Penguin Books (U.S.A.) 2006\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003cbr\u003eCopyright © R. K. Narayan, 1972\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIntroduction copyright © Pankaj Mishra, 2006 \u003cbr\u003eAll rights reserved\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003cbr\u003eThe decorations, drawn from Indian temple sculptures, are by R. K. Laxman.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003cbr\u003eLIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING IN PUBLICATION DATA \u003cbr\u003eNarayan, R. K., 1906-2001. \u003cbr\u003eThe Ramayana : a shortened modern prose version of the Indian epic (suggested by the Tamil version of \u003cbr\u003eKamban) \/ R.K. Narayan ; introduction by Pankaj Mishra. \u003cbr\u003ep. cm.—(Penguin classics)\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eeISBN : 978-0-143-03967-9\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e1. Rama (Hindu deity)—Fiction. 2. Epic literature, Tamil—Adaptations. I. Kampar, 9th cent. \u003cbr\u003eRamayanam. II. Title. III. Series. \u003cbr\u003ePR9499.3.N3R36 2006 \u003cbr\u003e297.5’922—dc22 2006045201\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003cbr\u003eThe scanning, uploading and distribution of this book via the Internet or via any other means \u003cbr\u003ewithout the permission of the publisher is illegal and punishable by law. Please purchase \u003cbr\u003eonly authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in or encourage electronic \u003cbr\u003epiracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIntroduction\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn the summer of 1988 sanitation workers across North India went on strike. Their demand was simple: they wanted the federal government to sponsor more episodes of a television serial based on the Indian epic \u003ci\u003eRamayana\u003c\/i\u003e (Romance of Rama). The serial, which had been running on India’s state-owned television channel for more than a year, had proved to be an extraordinarly popular phenomenon, with more than eighty million Indians tuning in to every weekly episode. Streets in all towns and cities emptied on Sunday mornings as the serial went on the air. In villages with no electricity people usually gathered around a rented television set powered by a car battery. Many bathed ritually and garlanded their television sets before settling down to watch Rama, the embodiment of righteousness, triumph over adversity.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWhen the government, faced with rising garbage mounds and a growing risk of epidemics, finally relented and commissioned more episodes of \u003ci\u003eThe Ramayana,\u003c\/i\u003e not just the sanitation workers but millions of Indians celebrated. More than a decade and many reruns later, the serial continues to inspire reverence among Indians everywhere, and remains for many the primary mode of experiencing India’s most popular epic.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe reasons for this may not be immediately clear to an uninitiated outsider: the serial, cheaply made by a Bollywood filmmaker, abounds in ham acting and tinselly sets, and the long, white beards of its many wise, elderly men look perilously close to dropping off.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eBut it wasn’t so much its kitschy, Bollywood aspect that endeared the serialization to Indians as its invoking of what is  easily the most influential narrative tradition in human history: the story of Rama, the unjustly exiled prince. It may be impossible to prove R. K. Narayan’s claim that every Indian “is aware of the story of \u003ci\u003eThe Ramayana\u003c\/i\u003e in some measure or other.” But it will sound true to most Indians. Indeed, the popular appeal of the story of Rama among ordinary people distinguishes it from much of Indian literary tradition, which, supervised by upper-caste Hindus, has been forbiddingly elitist.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThere is really no Western counterpart in either the Hellenic or Hebraic tradition to the influence that this originally secular story, transmitted orally through many centuries, has exerted over millions of people. \u003ci\u003eThe Iliad\u003c\/i\u003e and \u003ci\u003eThe Odyssey\u003c\/i\u003e are, primarily, literary texts, but not even Aesop’s fables or the often intensely moral Greek myths shape the daily lives of present-day inhabitants of Greece. In contrast, \u003ci\u003eThe Ramayana\u003c\/i\u003e continues to have a profound emotional and psychological resonance for Indians.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Penguin Classics","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46302156095717,"sku":"NP9780143039679","price":16.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1842\/7735\/files\/9780143039679.jpg?v=1767741156","url":"https:\/\/k12savings.com\/products\/the-ramayana-isbn-9780143039679","provider":"K12savings","version":"1.0","type":"link"}