Reading Notes: Epified Mahabharata, Part B

KARNA. His origin story, and abandonment by his mother because he’s kind of an illegitimate son, is told here. It kind of makes me want to do a story inspired by Karna himself: the dark-edged, bitter-smiled fighter who seemingly came from nowhere but plays at the level of princes, and is eventually revealed to be a bastard prince himself. Realistically, it would probably be better suited for a longer work, but I love Karna to death, and I had to at least option it.

“The curse that had haunted Constantinople for generations had come to visit Pandu at last.”

Out of the five Pandus, I found Bhima the most interesting, so I found the description of Kunti meeting his godly father really interesting: Bhima is born out of Vayu’s “stormy embrace.” It’s pretty fitting that this stormy son is born from his father the wind god’s equally turbulent hug, and that he’s born with the wind’s strength and speed. Who knows—a story about a stormy son could be pretty fun to write, too.

The story of the blind king’s sons is really interesting here, too, delved into with more depth than the other reading I’d done. Here, the queen gives birth to a lifeless lump of flesh instead of an actual human; she’s disgusted and upset, because she had been promised a blessing of a hundred sons. V returned to keep his promise, though, and had the flesh divided into a hundred parts, each of those parts cast into a pot of oil; when the queen took them out of the pots, they were human babies. This detail has a sort of clone army/fantasy Dr. Frankenstein feel to it that I love, and it could be pretty interesting to look at what it’s like to either be or be surrounded by that miraculous, terrible army of sons.

Not to mention the fact that all sorts of terrible omens went down while the flesh lumps were cooking into babies in their pots, which the royal couple couldn’t see, being blind and all. (There’s an interesting idea: the royal family of a kingdom becoming blind once they ascend to the throne, trading physical sight for something a little more otherworldly; knowing you’ll have to be next in line to sacrifice your vision someday.)

Or the fact that the delighted mother held up her firstborn son from his pot—but because she was blind, she couldn’t see what everyone else saw: that there was something terrible about him, even demonic. “They were sons who could only be loved by a blind father, and a mother who had forsaken sight.” Yes, please. Sign me the heck up.

It also makes sense that the Pandavas and their cousins would be automatically, naturally opposed, if the Pandavas are golden demigods, more than human and loved by everyone, while the cousins are feared and slightly demonic and less-than-human to everyone.

I also appreciate that D’s anger and life quest against his cousins is more motivated here, and he’s depicted as more of a person than just a black-and-white villain. He hated his cousins because they swept in and everyone treated them like heroes where they’d treated D and his brothers with fear and suspicion, and his own uncle came to him as a mentor and warned that he’d need to wipe out the Pandavas or they would take everything from him. It goes back to that old saying—“Every villain is a hero in his own mind”—and I love getting to see his POV here.

Bibliography: Epified: The Mahabharata, by Epified TV. Source: YouTube.

Image Credit: Blindfolded by Hair, by Anemone123. Source: Pixabay.

Reading Notes: Epified Mahabharata, Part A

Maybe it’s not surprising, but this time around with the Mahabharata, a lot of the same elements struck me as before. Sometimes they stood out to me more, since this version is a bit simplified and the different drawings make it easier to keep the large cast from getting mixed up—but sometimes, I saw the stories with the exact same measures of potential as last time. That’s fine, I guess, since there were a lot of stories that went untold from my notes.

First off, I’m still intrigued about doing something with Devarat’s “terrible oath” (which gives him the new name, Bhishma, “he of the terrible oath”). Especially because this retelling frames it in such ominous consequences: it will lead to a terrible war, horrible bloodshed and consequences. Really, I see two main ways to spin this terrible oath of his: either some promise that comes back to bite him royally, or some kind of oath of revenge, which ends up setting the stage for the story.

Also, I didn’t realize the first time around that Bhishma’s dad was so upset by his son’s sacrifice in his name, or that he was the one who granted Bhishma’s ability to choose the time of his own death (seen at the end of the Mahabharata). Apparently, he granted it as a boon in return for his sacrifice of the potential of a wife and family. Interesting stuff.

Then there was also this quote, which I found really interesting: “Bhishma kept his promise. Under him, the kingdom became strong; he watched over it like a silent guardian.” A silent, watcher guardian like that—maybe watching from the shadows—is really interesting as well.

I also find it interesting that these mortals casually coexisted with other people who were widely suspected but not officially confirmed to be avatars of their gods. I always find that juxtaposition interesting—the shoulder-brushing of the everyday and the otherworldly, the fantastic—and I’m not sure how I’d use this one yet, but it’s probably the option that interests me the most so far. At this point, I'm thinking maybe a god of war in teenage form—actually, scratch that, just a teenage god of war (it makes plenty of sense that the god of war would be a hotheaded teenager, really)—joins up with the local kids' fight club scene and pretty much ruins it in the process; it'll never be the same. What's that old quote? We'll be remembered more for what we destroy than what we create? Sounds like his style.

Bibliography: Epified: The Mahabharata, by Epified TV. Source: YouTube.

Image Credit:  Dark Face by Pexels. Source: Pixabay.

Portfolio: Table of Contents

They say the eyes are the window to the soul. If that’s the case, the people in this collection of stories would probably reach for some sunglasses.


What Comes Around  In a world where people's shadows are the physical embodiments of their sins in past lives, one student desperately wants to find out what his past self did wrong—and another student desperately wants not to.

Guns for Hands  Since she was thirteen, Reagan has known she'll have to kill her sister someday. So far, the girls have survived in that muddy gap between knowing and doing—but as the bodies pile up around her sister, it's finally time for Reagan to act.





Image Credit: Dark Shadows at Evening. Source: Max Pixel.


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Reading Notes: PDE Mahabharata, Part D

In this section (the story "Bhima and Dushasana," to be more specific), we finally get some resolution to the oath Bhima took back when Y gambled their lives away and Dushasana tried to shame Draupadi. At the time, he swore he'd kill Dushasana and drink his blood, and that's exactly what happens here: Bhima takes the guy on in battle, breaks his back, then chops off his head and drinks his blood. Other soldiers who witness the whole thing run away, saying, "This is not a man." I'm always really interested in that line between human and inhuman—and that grey area between them. In the fact that sometimes humanity is determined by how a person acts or thinks or feels instead of by what they actually are. And characters who muddle that line are always fascinating to me.

One thing that interested me in the previous section of readings was the dynamic between Draupadi and her second husband (of five), Bhima. I found it interesting that, even though her first two picks for concurrent husbands were Arjuna and Y, she actually seems closest to Bhima, and vice versa. When she was in trouble with the king's brother-in-law, she went to Bhima for help; he came through for her, and she stuck around to see the carnage. They're both also clearly the type to take dark blood oaths involving the lifeblood of their enemies (or in this case, a shared enemy). So I was also struck by the fact that, when the Pandava brothers finally took on their enemy cousin in "Duryodhana in the Lake," it was Bhima—not leader Y or golden child Arjuna—who killed the Big Bad. Not only that, but then: He danced round Duryodhana a time, then, kicking his enemy's head, cried out at length, "Draupadi is avenged." You'd think, since they're all brothers and all also husbands of Draupadi, that the rest of the Pandavas would approve. But instead: Yudhishthira was wroth; he smote Bhima on the face and said, "O accursed villain, thou wilt cause all men to speak ill of us." All this to say, I guess, that Bhima is the Pandava for me, and I find the idea of him interesting, especially in the context of his relationship with his wife, his brothers, and his enemies.

Bhishma gets wounded in the big war, and everyone knows he's dying, but he's still moved to a different location, and it's mentioned that he'll see the war's end before he actually dies. Later, in "The Pandavas and Bhishma," it's revealed that his slow death process is attributed to a supernatural ability he's been given: "the gift of choosing the moment of his own death." The introduction to this segment of the story explains that he's "waiting for the solstice, and before he dies he will instruct the survivors of the battle on how to rule the world that has survived." There are two things I like about this: 1) The idea of someone with a gift like that on their deathbed, prolonging death to either accomplish something by it or wait to see some kind of outcome, and 2) I'm always a sucker for "looking forward at the world that's survived" tropes. I'm not sure if I'd use this as inspiration for a weekly story or not, but it has potential. Duly noted.

I also found the father-son dynamic between Arjuna and his child really interesting in "King Yudhishthira's Horse." Arjuna is traveling from country to country, claiming new lands for his brother the king. Eventually, he comes across a rajah, who recognizes the king's name and claims to be Arjuna's son. But Arjuna scorns him, saying that if he were his son, he wouldn't be afraid of Arjuna. A fight breaks out between them, and the son kills his father in the battle, but then regrets it and helps bring him back to life. I'm less interested in adapting that part, and more intrigued in that initial dynamic between father and son: the high-ranking dad who wanders from place to place and is approached by this kid who swears to be his, but the dad doesn't recognize him (he has plenty of kids) and isn't going to be quick to claim him. More than anything else, I'm curious about how the kid would respond to that, what she/he would do to win the dad's approval, and how their dynamic would evolve as they worked somewhat alongside each other.

This is just a minor detail, especially compared to some of the notes above, but a small line in "Parikshit" really caught my attention: Krishna had already given some sort of promise and in view of the fact he never uttered a falsehood, he uttered the words ‘Let this child revive.’ It could be interesting to play with the idea of a character who always tells the truth—not because he's an honest, upstanding guy, but because he literally always has to follow through on what he says. A curse or something, I guess. I think it'd be a lot of fun to look at that grey area between him always being forced to do the right thing, which would in some ways technically make him a good guy, but not actually being a good guy on the inside or, some might say, where it counts. Moral ambiguity is the spice of storytelling life, after all.

Also, I probably wouldn't have any use for this in a weekly story, but this is a powerful line from the above and I have to point it out:"For all, Mother, that you look so happy, do you not mourn your son?" And she answered, "Before, I had only one, Abhimanyu, but now I have many, for I see my boy in every wounded soldier."

In "Horse Sacrifice," Draupadi is officially designated "Queen of the Sacrifice," and that sounds pretty cool.

So far, though, I think "The Forest and its Ghosts" is my favorite installment I've read. After a long while of mourning, a ceremony is arranged and performed, so that all the fallen warriors and "lost ones" everybody's missed return at nightfall. It's only for the one night, of course, but it was really interesting to read about the characters reuniting with fallen family members killed in the war: the blind king and his son, Karna and Kunti, and so on. More than that, there was the imagery of them returning from the waters of the Ganges:

Suddenly the waters began to heave and foam, and Vyasa muttered holy words and called out the names of the dead one by one. Soon all the heroes who had been slain arose one by one. In chariots they came, and on horseback and riding upon lordly elephants. They all uttered triumphant cries; drums were sounded and trumpets were blown, and it seemed as if the armies of the Pandavas and Kauravas were once again assembled for battle, for they swept over the river like a mighty tempest.

It seems like a great way to play with character dynamics, guilt, mood/atmosphere, and supernatural world-building, so it might be fun to do a story inspired by this one, where the dead get to return for some small interval for some small purpose. And for some personal cost, of course. (Life? Blood? Memory? We'll see.)

Again, this one isn't for a weekly story, but I loved the setup and the death omens in "Death of Krishna," and I'd like to keep them in mind just because they're cool and inspiring.

And then finally, there's "The Afterlife," and one last striking line I might end up using as my weekly inspiration: a description of one of the Pandavas' descendants in heaven as "the star-bright companion of the lord of night."




Bibliography: Mahabharata Online: Public Domain Edition. Source: Laura Gibbs's Indian Epics blog.

Image Credit: Underwater Diving by Unsplash. Source: Pixabay.

Reading Notes: PDE Mahabharata, Part C

In the story "Arjuna and Indra," one line stood out to me in particular. It comes after Arjuna is cursed by a nymph because he rejected her advances; understandably, Arjuna is less than thrilled at the idea of being cursed. But Indra, the god and his dad, assures him, "This curse will work out for thy good." I'm not completely sure yet what I would do with that, but I do think it has potential: I like the idea of someone suffering through the curse (or whatever curse analogue I would end up using for the story), having always been told it was for the best and would be a blessing in disguise—but then getting fed up with the whole thing, and deciding to do something about it.

"Bhima and Hanuman," meanwhile, didn't have much going for it in the way of plot, but it's still probably my favourite one from this section so far. In it, Bhima comes across Hanuman in the forest; after some minor confusion at the start, the two end up talking, and having a good conversation. It turns out they're half-brothers—both sons of the wind god, Vayu. Ultimately, they hug it out and go their separate ways. I've always been a sucker for a good brother story, and I find the dynamics of half-brothers especially interesting; I might end up taking the bond between these two as the bones of the story, then seeing what I can do with them. (The Great Expectations story, maybe?)

Another thing I found interesting is the way mortals and celestials casually coexist in this world. In "Duryodhana and the Gandharvas," for example, a group of nymphs and other heavenly beings are hanging around the forest and refuse to let the prince and his men pass. The prince, completely undeterred, orders that they get out of the way, and the nymphs aren't having it. I guess I just find it really interesting that the nymphs and other non-human creatures are so accepted and commonplace that the humans don't even think twice about treating them like regular people, and vice versa. It might be a fun concept to play around with in a fantasy world.

And then there's "Duryodhana and the Gandharvas," which features one of the most interesting ideas so far. Duryodhana has officially called it quits on taking out his enemies, the Pandavas, and has decided to die instead. Which leads us to this little gem: 

But the daityas and danavas desired not that their favorite rajah should thus end his life lest their power should be weakened, and they sent to the forest a strange goddess who carried him away in the night. Then the demons, before whom Duryodhana was brought, promised to aid him in the coming struggle against the Pandavas, and he was comforted thereat, and abandoned his vow to die in solitude.

It's interesting in its own right, but it sort of makes me want to do a story in which the "hero" and "villain" are actually just two pawns that've been chosen by warring factions of gods (or, better: monsters) and manipulated into doing things for their masters' gain. I would obviously want to tell that story from the "villain's" POV, who's really more of a misguided antihero, and is pretty conflicted about the whole thing: yeah, maybe the monsters are using him, but they're also the only ones who seem to care about him, and he cares about them, too. What a messy situation and conflicted loyalties all around. (Edit: I looked back at this and realized I may have just described the plot of The Lion King II. Funny how these things happen.)

I also think Karna's natural invincibility is interesting. As mentioned again in "Karna and Indra," Karna's dad is the sun god, and Karna was born with armor that was part of him, and grew as he grew. In this story, he gets ripped off by Indra, godly dad of that brat Arjuna, and loses that armor: then "news went about that Karna was no longer invincible." I love the idea of this impassive, quietly bitter warrior, bastard child of both the royal family and one of the most powerful gods, who's gotten cheated by life so many times but who does have this supernatural gift of invincibility, just like his dad—and everyone knows it.

Also, even though Draupadi may have initially been won by Arjuna and almost given to Y because he's the oldest, I'm always struck by how she and Bhima seem like the best match out of all of them. Their bond seems closer, somehow, dark and bloody. There's the time Bhima swore he'd kill the prince and drink his blood, and Draupadi had a similar vow, when she swore she wouldn't tie her hair up again till she'd washed it in the blood of the prince's brother. And now in "Bhima and Kichaka," when a guy in the royal court keeps trying to assault Draupadi, Bhima is the first one she goes to. He promises to take care of it for her, and after he kills the guy, he learns that Draupadi was there the whole time: she wanted to see Bhima kill him. She smiles and commends him on a job well done, and he basically stands and kisses her head and says, "Go tell the other maids this guy is dead, because your immortal husband found out what he was up to and defended you." Because she and Bhima and the others are posing as servants for a year, and anything else would blow their cover. Long story short: I find their dynamic really interesting, especially compared to the rest of her husbands, and the couple that slays together, slays together, I guess.

Krishna has been one of my favourite characters of this epic so far, somewhat by default, but I was still surprised by how much I loved this exchange from "Krishna's Mission to the Kauravas." In it, Krishna visits his cousins to see if they can make peace with the Pandavas, because he genuinely loves both sets of cousins and so doesn't want to see them hurt each other. But the prince and his sidekicks are flat-out disrespectful, and the mild, gentle Krishna snaps for a second, revealing his true form in all its terrifying, godly glory: all breathed fire and sparking skin and divine entourage. Then, just as suddenly, he reverts back to his human form. I love this: the insanely powerful monster or god, strong and terrifying in his true form, who chooses to pose as a human most of the time and try to be one of them—but still isn't quite, and shows it from time to time.

Since Karna is my very favorite, though, I was pretty pained by "Krisha and Karna": after all Karna's been through, a lot of it at the hands (read: mouths) of the Pandavas, it seemed pretty stupid of them to approach him now, admit he's their brother, and act like that suddenly makes everything okay. He's kind of a tragic hero in that sense, because while he's sided with the villains of this piece, it totally makes sense why he did. The Pandavas were jerks to him and put him down for his adopted parents and supposedly low birth (when he's their own freaking brother), all because he was talented enough to challenge their skill. And the Kauravas took advantage of that, befriending Karna when nobody else would, treating him with respect and giving him power and treating him like one of their own.

When Krishna reveals Karna's true parentage and asks if he'll side with Kunti and his brothers because of it, Karna explains that he knows it won't end well for him, "Yet I cannot desert those who have given me their friendship. Besides, if I went with thee now, men would regard me as Arjuna's inferior. Arjuna and I must meet in battle, and fate will decide who is the greater. I know I shall fall in this war, but I must fight for my friends." Later, his birth mother approaches him, reveals that he's a half-god prince, and asks him to side with his real brothers. She mentions Arjuna in particular, Karna's half-brother and only real rival: "If you two were side by side you would conquer the world." But it's too little, too late, and I imagine it really must sting for Karna, only being approached and accepted for what he really is and should've had all along just because he's needed now. Because he's a threat if he's not on their side. Talk about mother of the year.

Two items of note from "The Armies at Kurukshetra." One, the fact that they recruited Bhima's demon son from way back when to fight in their army, and that guy sounds rad: Bhima's rakshasa son, the terrible Ghatotkacha, who had power to change his shape and create illusions, had also hastened to assist his kinsmen. And two: the blind king's charioteer, who hangs out with him at the back of the battle assembly and "related all that took place, having been gifted with divine vision by Vyasa."

And finally, in "The Battle Begins," we're treated to a whole host of terrible, fascinating omens. I don't think I would try to do anything with them for a weekly story, but they still strike me as really interesting, so I'm noting them here so I won't forget about them:

As both armies waited for sunrise, a tempest arose and the dawn was darkened by dust clouds, so that men could scarce behold one another. Evil were the omens. Blood dropped like rain out of heaven, while jackals howled impatiently, and kites and vultures screamed hungrily for human flesh. The earth shook, peals of thunder were heard, although there were no clouds, and angry lightning rent the horrid gloom; flaming thunderbolts struck the rising sun and broke in fragments with loud noise.

and this one, specifically the part about the maimed soldiers rising and fighting again: 

Many were slain, and rivers of blood laid down the dust; horses writhed in agony, and the air was filled with the shrieking and moaning of wounded men. Terrible were the omens, for headless men rose up and fought against one another; then the people feared that all who contended in that dread battle would be slain.

Bibliography: Mahabharata Online: Public Domain Edition. Source: Laura Gibbs's Indian Epics blog.

Image Credit: Dark Path at Night by Unsplash. Source: Pixabay.

Reading Notes: PDE Mahabharata, Part B

The image of a burning house, like in “The House of Fire,” is a really strong one—and the possibility of arson or pyros is always fun to play with. So I’ll keep that in mind moving forward.

In "Bhima and Hidimba," there's another reminder that this version of demons are able to shape shift, which could be interesting to use too.

Also, I was really intrigued by the fact that, in “Bhima and Hidimbi,” Bhima ended up marrying the demon woman who'd fallen in love with him despite her brother, unlike Rama's experience in the Ramayana. That pairing is really interesting—a monstrously strong human and a monster who only wants to be human—especially because of their dynamic: he helps her be human, and she protects him from monsters and other dangers. So that could be a fun concept to try out. Of course, their halfling son has potential, too: that element of being caught between two worlds, a freak to both the monsters and the humans. (Lorcan story?)

Then there's the idea of the blood-tax in "Bhima and Baka." At regular intervals, a lord ruling over a small town requires that a family sends him one of their members and a cart of rice as a sort of blood-tax sacrifice. If the family doesn't send anyone, he goes to their house anyways, and slaughters all the members. I find the idea of a blood-tax really interesting, especially if opened up for different interpretation, and then there's also the interesting tradition of stories where a village youth is sent to the local "dragon" as a sacrifice—it could be fun to twist that around in a way that suits my storytelling interests more, give it more of a modern fantasy flair.

Later, in “Birth of Draupadi,” two different things caught my eye. The first is the birth of the twins themselves to the former king and friend Drona took down: “the miraculous births of Drupada's son and daughter from sacrificial fire.” It’s a fascinating idea with tons of potential, and just think of the characters themselves: what kind of people would these kids be, born of vengeance and sacrificial fire instead of love and happiness? Answer: my kind of kids.

The fire-born daughter’s fate sounds interesting, too, especially in a male-dominated story like this: A voice out of heaven said, "This dusky girl will become the chief of all women. Many kshatriyas must die because of her, and the Kauravas will suffer from her. She will accomplish the decrees of the gods." Talk about a legacy to live up to. Also, though, now that I think about it, it would be really interesting if her fate were to live as a sort of fixer/enforcer for the gods instead: the fire-born girl carrying out their dirty work, blood on her hands.

Also, this is kind of an aside from the point of all my other notes, but will anyone ever quit putting Karna down? Take the latest scene in "Draupadi's Swayamwara," for instance. The guy deserves better, and I'm waiting from the day he quits accepting everything with a sardonic bow and a bitter smile and starts putting everyone in their place: At length proud Karna strode forward; he took the bow and bent it and fixed the bowstring. Then he seized an arrow. Drupada and his son were alarmed, fearing he might succeed and claim the bride. Suddenly Draupadi intervened, for she would not have the son of a charioteer for her lord. She said, speaking loudly, "I am a king's daughter, and will not wed with the base-born."

Karna smiled bitterly, his face aflame. He cast down the bow and walked away, gazing towards the sun. He said, "O Sun! Be my witness that I cast aside the bow, not because I am unable to hit the mark, but because Draupadi scorns me."

In the introduction notes for "The Burning of the Forest," I found the description of the goddess Maya really interesting: she's "the goddess of the illusion that we call reality." That immediately conjures up something along the lines of a Gaiman Sandman character, but I do think it has potential, so it's worth keeping in mind.

Then there's the concept in "Pandavas Victorious" that caught my eye: as the intro notes state, "It is now time for Yudhishthira to declare himself a supreme monarch by performing a Rajasuya sacrifice. This will require that he confront a rival king..." I'm really fascinated by the Mafia, and this reminds me a lot of the way members are usually required to kill someone else to become "made" within the ranks. Thinking about that connection makes me think it would be interesting to take modern crime concepts and conflicts and transplant them into genre settings, so I'll look into doing that sometime.

Finally, I also loved the bloody weight of the line that Draupadi gave before they left on their exile, about her husband and their new enemy: "From this day my hair will fall over my forehead until Bhima shall have slain Duhshasana and drunk his blood; then shall Bhima tie up my tresses while his hands are yet wet with the blood of Duhshasana."

Bibliography: Mahabharata Online: Public Domain Edition. Source: Laura Gibbs's Indian Epics blog.

Image Credit: "The birth of Science" by Sergio Boscaino. Source: Flickr.

Week 5 Story Planning

This week, I ended up with a lot more story options than usual. I haven't settled on one yet, but I have narrowed it down to three different routes, so here's what I'm working with so far.

Option #1: From "King Shantanu and Ganga"

In this story, the goddess Ganga makes a pact with the eight celestial Vasus: When they get condemned to being born on earth as mortals, they approach Ganga, who agrees to act as their human mother. But she also promises "that she would cast them one by one into the [river] soon after birth so that they might return speedily to their celestial state." I like the idea of one character grimly swearing to murder another character on that character's behalf, either so they can gain a certain power or gain access to a certain place, or because it'll give them some temporary advantage or revery them to their true form. Whichever way, I think it could be entertaining to write, with some interesting character dynamics and mood to play around with.


Option #2: From "King Shantanu and Satyavati"

Another element that caught my eye was the introduction to Vyasa's mother. When asked who she is, she replies that she ferries passengers across the river. Granted, she's the adopted daughter of a fishermen, so she means that pretty literally—but it could be loads of fun to make the jump from that to a different kind of river entirely, something with the weight of the Greek River Styx and the feel of a modern-day fantasy setting. So that's an option too.


Option #3: "Gandhari and Dhritarashtra"

In this one, when the titular king and queen have a son, there are all sorts of terrible, ominous omens. The royal couple's advisors explain that their son will bring something terrible upon their kingdom, and that it'll be better for everyone just to get rid of him while they can—sacrifice the part to save the whole, and all that jazz. But the prince's parents are fond of him—he's their favorite son—and they decide to ignore the omens and the advisors and the best interests of their kingdom, just to spare him. I love the idea of that: of the main character being close to someone and knowing they're going to do something terrible someday, but not being able to bring herself to prevent it. Of choosing to let that happen before she'll choose to let this one person die—even though she knows that means she'll be just as responsible for all that tragedy when the other shoe finally does drop. Again, plenty of room for interesting character dynamics and a (theoretically) compelling protagonist; if I used this one, I think I'd like to give a tiny taste of that huge disaster, just to test the protag's resolve and see what emotional response comes of it.


Interestingly, even just that small amount of thinking through each of these gave me a little more clarity, and I think I'll wind up picking the third story to develop. I've got a better idea of who the characters in that are, what the plot and stakes might look like, so that's probably what I'll go with.



Bibliography: Mahabharata Online: Public Domain Edition. Source: Laura Gibbs's Indian Epics blog.
Image Credit: Dark Splash by Pexels. Source: Pixabay.

Reading Notes: PDE Mahabharata, Part A

The first snippet that struck me as interesting came from "Vyasa and Ganesha," when it mentions Vyasa's strength. It mentions that he was "so devoted to asceticism that the gods feared he was seeking to rob him of their power," and they hand-delivered gifts to him as bribes. I'm not sure what I'd do with it, but the idea of the gods grudgingly courting a mortal because they're afraid of his growing strength sounds like a ton of fun.

From "King Shantanu and Ganga," I was also really inspired by the idea of Bhishma, a mortal (demigod) prince who "came to have both a human and divine identity."

There's also the pact that the goddess Ganga made with the celestial Vasus: when they get condemned to being born on earth as mortals, they approach Ganga, who agrees to be their human mother. But she also promises "that she would cast them one by one into the [river] soon after birth so that they might return speedily to their celestial state." The idea of one character grimly promising to murder another character on their behalf, so they can gain a certain power or gain access to a certain place or because it'll give some temporary advantage or revert them to their true form, is really interesting.

In "King Shantanu and Satyavati," the introduction to Vyasa's mother caught my eye, too: when asked who she is, she replies, that she ferries passengers across the river. She's the adopted daughter of a fisherman, of course, and means that quite plainly—but it could be loads of fun to make that jump to the Greek River Styx, and adapt the concept to a dark contemporary fantasy story.

When it came to Shantanu's son by Ganga and his portrayal in "Devavrata's Vow," the reading notes and the story after it allude to some "terrible oath" Devavrata makes in order to secure happiness for his father; his new name even means terrible oath. I was expecting something much worse than just renouncing the throne and the possibility of heirs, so if I were to use this one as my weekly inspiration, I'd probably go with that darker, more foreboding sense of the oath I initially got from this.

Something about Devavrata's role in "Bhishma at the Swayamvara" caught my interest: I think it's the way he was willing to take on the world with a bloody weapon and a grin, all for a prize he knew he could win but never have. "...he stood alert and smiling, with bow drawn and his back to the royal maidens, ready to do battle for his prize against a world in arms."

The next element I found inspiring came from "Gandhari and Dhritarashtra," when it talked about the blind king and his queen. Whenever she's in his presence, she wears a blindfold, making them equals. Something about that stands out to me; it could be interesting if a person's blindness is contagious, making others within a certain distance blind too. (Or really, the blindness is just a placeholder; it could be that, or it could be something else entirely.)

From the same story: when one of their sons was born, there were all kinds of terrible omens, and the advisors explained to the royal couple that their son would bring something terrible upon their kingdom, and it would be better for everyone just to get rid of him. Sacrifice one part to save the whole and all that. But his parents are fond of him—he's the favorite son—and they ignore the advise and spare him. I love the idea of that—of being close to someone and knowing they're going to go on to do or be something terrible someday, but not being able to bring yourself to prevent it. Letting them go on, even though that means letting that awful event happen someday, and owning it—making yourself equally responsible for it in the process.

The next story, "Pandavas and Kauravas," talks about the rivalry between the two factions of brothers—sons of the pale king and sons of the blind king. That was interesting, the fact that they ended up being raised together, treated equally and like brothers, but still had that sense of rivalry and division, little packs of wolves. The description of the pale king's "sons," all demigods with different fathers, was really striking, too: He saw the stately lady Kunti and the five boys, as beautiful as gods, who stood beside her with the bearing of young lions. At her right was the eldest, about twelve years old, and beside him his brother, a year younger, broad of shoulder and long of arm, as strong as a yearling bull. At her left was a slender, dark-skinned boy with curling hair, and close to him were the younger brothers, twins of astonishing beauty.

Of course, the short passage about the sages was even more inspiring and worth noting: The porter had heard tales of sages such as these: how they had freed their hearts of anger and fear and all desire and gained such power of soul that they could live as long as they wished to live; that they could travel a thousand miles in the wink of an eye and could behold the whole universe as if it were a plum in the palms of their hands. 

In the story "Bhima and the Nagas," Bhima ends up almost dying and taking a trip to the underworld because of that—but he returns from that trip with new, supernatural strength. The idea that he not only bounced back from death, but returned better than ever, is really interesting, and I think there are a lot of ways it can be twisted around and played with.

Out of everything so far, it's possibly the initial setup of "Ekalavya" that I love the most. Drona is famous throughout the different kingdoms by now as this great trainer of warriors (which automatically makes me think of Phil from Hercules, but that's beside the point). Anyways, Drona accepted all kinds of pupils from all over—but the only warrior he turned away was the prince of the robber king: This young man pleaded that he might be trained as an archer, but without avail. Drona said, "Are not the Bhils highwaymen and cattle-lifters? It would be a sin, indeed, to impart unto one of them great knowledge in the use of weapons." I love the idea of this—the heir of a criminal empire being turned away from real life because everyone knows his reputation and his family business, knows he's got blood on his hands. So far that, more than anything else, is calling to me for the weekly story. But I'll have to wait and see if I find the right thing to do with it.

Later, in "The Arrival of Karna," I was struck by the eponymous character. He arrives at the contest between the cousins, the eldest and illegitimate son of the Pandavas' mother and the sun god, and they laugh him off as nothing. But he ends up being just as good as their very best, golden boy warrior—maybe even better. That makes the Pandavas all petty and insecure; when Karna has been awarded a kingdom by their cousins to elevate his status, he still lovingly and humbly embraces his poor, charioteer adopted dad, which the Pandavas mock him for. They make fun of his weak, adopted dad and his charioteer background and tell him to go drive a cart and leave the fighting for warriors and princes, basically. And in response, it's just: Karna grew pale with wrath; his lips quivered, but he answered not a word. He heaved a deep sigh and looked towards the sun. At the end of all this, it turns out all the legitimate princes are brats, and I'm officially gunning for Karna to conquer all of them.

Bibliography: Mahabharata Online: Public Domain Edition. Source: Laura Gibbs's Indian Epics blog.

Image Credit: Glowing Jellyfish by GIRAFFETING. Source: Pixabay.

Feedback Focus

I remember trying these techniques in the sister course last semester, so I thought it would be interesting to see if my ranking of them would change. For the most part, it didn't, but it was still kind of funny to go back and compare.

Reading out loud is one of those techniques that sounds like it should be great, but it's never really worked out for me. For some reason, I find myself focusing more on the sound of my voice instead of what I'm reading—probably because I've never liked my delivery when reading prose. I'm not great with inflection, and it tends to distract me.

I do love the copy-and-paste technique, though, and I've always used a variation of it even before I learned about it here. I like it because I think better on paper anyways, and when I have the source material right there in front of me, I can skip down to a new paragraph underneath to put down all my stray thoughts; if I need to reference anything, the original is right there for easy access. It also helps me make sure I've addressed everything I want to address. It also helps me to take notes as I go, which I prefer, because otherwise I may get distracted by the time I get to the end and forget to make certain points.

As for the timer approach, I'd rank it somewhere between the other two in terms of usefulness. I do see some perks to it, unlike the "reading aloud" approach, because it did give me plenty of flexibility and time in which to read the story and get my thoughts together. The element of time itself was a little distracting, though, since I kept glancing at my time budget while I was reading the story, and then ended up with more time than I needed afterwards and felt like I was killing time waiting. It may be more useful if I have a longer reading selection I want to break up into chunks, though, or a list of shorter articles/stories/etc. to read through, so I'll keep it in mind for future reference.




Image Credit: Temporal Distance (Hourglass) by moritz320. Source: Pixabay.

Week 4 Story: Emergency Exit

“Hey,” I said, shaking the man’s shoulder. Almost gently at first, then a little rougher when he didn’t respond. “Hey, get up. We don’t have much time.”

He rolled over to face me then, blinking muzzily. “What?”

“Nursing check within twelve minutes,” I said, nodding over at the reinforced door. “Maybe sooner. Don’t you want to get out of here?”

Now he sat up all the way, wincing and clutching at his side. Under the sickly fluorescents, he looked thin and pale, short blond hair slicked with sweat. That was what happened when you paid another inmate to shank you, apparently.

Not for the first time since I’d been dragged in here for suicide watch, I wondered if he really had been trying to get himself killed, or if he’d just wanted to buy himself a better shot at getting out of here.

He looked over at me, thin mouth melting into a scowl. “Who the h—”

“Your roommate for the past day, Chris,” I said impatiently. “Cheaper to use inmates for suicide watch than paying extra nurses. Look, I’ve got us a line out of here, but I need your help. Do you still want out?”

He hesitated for a minute, taking in the plain little room they’d stuck us in—gray walls and floor, a mattress on the floor, and nothing else. Wouldn’t want to give the saps in here anything else to off themselves with.

I’d figured he’d take his time deciding: they were usually a pretty suspicious lot in here, and he didn’t have any reason to trust me. For all he knew, this was some elaborate trap to nail him for attempted escape.

But then he just looked down at his long, thin fingers, cupped gently around his wound.

“Yes,” he breathed.

“Okay, then.” I stood. “Time to leave prison life behind.”

***

I’d already worked out our escape route while Chris was asleep, and now we clambered down a dark, narrow tunnel. Chris kept pausing to check his wound, surprised that it hadn’t started bleeding again. Even though he moved with all the grace of a stoned rhino, he didn’t make any noise. I wondered if he’d noticed that, too.

“Well?” I said eventually. “Why’d you do it?”

“Do what?”

I turned to give him a look. Not a sharp one, exactly—but by this point, we were way past playing games.

After a minute, he mumbled, “You don’t know how bad I wanted out of there. You don’t know what it’s like.”

“Right,” I said. “Because you’re the only one here who’s ever spent any time in prison.”

But he was right. I had no clue what it was like. Any of it.

“Half the time it was okay,” he said slowly. “I was okay. I’d keep my head down, do my time, get out. Maybe even get to see my boy grow up. God, just to see one of his baseball games...”

He was losing me now with the boy and the baseball. But he was losing lots of things, so I didn’t complain. This was his time, not mine.

“But the rest of the time,” he went on. I turned to see him shake his head. “The rest of the time, it was like I’d never get out. Like I was dying a little bit every day. Hell, half the time I wanted to die. Like the only thing that could fix this mess was a visit from Mr. Death himself.”

“Well,” I said, raising my eyebrows. “You don’t have to worry about that anymore, at least.”

We kept going for a while in silence. I tried to prod him along so we’d be gone before the next nurse made her round and saw Chris’s bed was empty. But we hadn’t made it far enough when I heard the nurse’s thin, high voice call the guards.

I glanced over at Chris, and knew he’d heard, too. His hearing was limitless now, after all.

He stopped short, examining the tunnels around us. Probably he was realizing that they were the wrong size and shape to be part of this prison. That it didn’t really make sense for a prison to have tunnels like this at all.

And then his sharp new hearing heard the nurse say, “Chris Wellers—he’s gone,” and he knew.

He twisted around and scrambled down the tunnel, running full-tilt in a space that’d barely supported a crouch moments ago. Perspective really was everything.

A second later, the entire structure shifted, blurring into one of the prison hallways instead. Chris sprinted to the little suicide watch broom closet at the end of it.

When he saw his own body lying on the mattress, pale and still, he actually flinched.

“I don’t...” he whispered, but he didn’t finish.

He didn’t need to. Understand. They always said that, even though most of them really did understand.

“Sure you do,” I said. "You never woke up, Chris."

He turned and looked at me then, stumbling over himself to back away, and I wondered what he saw. Not an inmate decked out in orange anymore, that was for sure—that had probably ended with the tunnel—but still, I was curious. It was a weird thing, never knowing what you actually looked like.

“You,” he whispered. “You’re the one who did this.”

“No,” I said, voice rising a little despite myself, sharper than I’d meant. “You did. I’m just here to clean up your mess.”

“Mr. Death, reporting for duty,” he said bitterly, staring over at his body, even as he clutched the side that would never bleed again. “Lucky me.”

I took a deep breath, but didn’t answer this time. No need. The nurse and guards would come back for his body, and Chris would watch them cart it away, and then the fight would leave him.

He’d face me. Maybe even apologize. And then he’d follow me out quietly.

They always did.

There was only one way out, after all.

Author's Note: Last week when I read the Ramayana, I was struck by an exchange between the death god Yama and a mortal character. Yama had dealt with death plenty of times, obviously, but he was intrigued by this mortal character on his metaphorical deathbed. In that story, Yama was intrigued by the man's strength, but I ended up flipping that in my story without really meaning to, resulting in a story where Death is intrigued by man's weakness instead.

Bibliography: The Ramayana: A Shortened Modern Prose Version of the Indian Epic by R. K. Narayan.

Image Credit: Emergency Exit Sign. Source: Max Pixel.