The first thing in the notes to catch my interest was something that a poet told Rama: “Owing to the potency of your name, I became a sage, able to view the past, present, and future as one.” That’s an interesting brand of clairvoyance—seeing all the times at once, jumbled together, something you have to untangle to make sense of—rather than the usual “glimpses of the future interrupting the present” thing. It would also be a lot harder to live with, which means it has nice potential for a character complication.
I also find the situation that Ravana’s engineered pretty interesting. He and his brothers, “through austerity and prayers,” were granted “extraordinary powers” from the gods. But then the brothers turned right back around “and now threaten to destroy our worlds and enslave” the gods. Because the gods granted the powers, they can’t take them back again or do much to combat them. It’s even more interesting if you view the entire situation as one long con carried out by Ravana and his brothers, which I’m inclined to do.
Early on, the story also mentions that Rama and his brothers were born to the childless king only after the king performed a complex sacrifice—and I love the idea. Instead of being a miracle baby or being brought about by lots or prayer or good karma or whatever, imagine knowing you owe your entire existence to some dark and costly sacrifice. I’d be really interested in seeing the boys born out of that, blood and blades instead of love and hope.
I was also struck by the description of the desert wasteland Rama and the others come across—the cursed land: “Bleached bones lay where animals had perished, including those of monstrous serpents with jaws open in deadly thirst; into these enormous jaws had rushed...elephants desperately seeking shade, all dead and fossilized, the serpent and elephant alike.” It’s a setting with plenty of potential, and it would give me the freedom to tell a whole range of stories this week, which I find appealing.
Then there’s the fate of the mother and her two sons who went around destroying everything after her equally destructive husband was killed: He met their challenge by cursing them. “Since you are destroyers of life, may you become asuras and dwell in the nether worlds.” (Till now they had been demigods. Now they were degraded to demonhood.) The three at once underwent a transformation; their features and stature became forbidding, and their natures changed to match. The sons left to seek the company of superdemons. I don’t actually know if a story inspired by that would fit the weekly format, so I may have to save it as inspiration for something else, but that’s so up my alley.
At another point, when Sita’s miserable and a singing bird irritates the heck out of her, she exclaims, “The sins I committed in a previous birth have assumed your form and come to torture me now!” I’m interested in taking that idea and making it quite literal, just swapping out the bird for another person.
Throughout the king and Kaikeyi’s exchange, I also kind of loved their dynamic: he was so dramatic about everything, while she was cool and collected. I think it could be really fun to give that to another pair, either a couple who’s been together forever or just work partners, with a drama queen for the guy and a matter-of-fact ice queen for the girl.
Finally, I was also interested when Kaikeyi explained the situation with the king’s old vows to Rama, and said: “It is your duty to help your father fulfill his promise. Otherwise he will be damning himself in this and other worlds. You owe him a duty as his son.” And Rama just accepted it, realized he needed to do this for his father’s sake, and went on. I’d probably use that as the basis for a story about a son or daughter carrying out something unpleasant for the dad’s sake, since the same bones are all there.
Bibliography: The Ramayana: A Shortened Modern Prose Version of the Indian Epic by R. K. Narayan.
Image Credit: "Ravana" by Sachin Nagar. Source: Indian Epics: Reading Guides.
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