INTRODUCTION
The moon is perpetually moving behind the clouds, the flowers forever fragrant and the celestial koel calling out endlessly in melodious tones. Almost every love story in Indian mythology is redolent with these romantic symbols from nature. For centuries, poets and artists have celebrated love by using beautiful, familiar images from nature, and continue to do so even today. This was my inspiration for rewriting a few of India's age-old love stories.
The love stories I have chosen are from the Ramayana, the Mahabharata, the Padma Purana, the Shiva Purana and the Bhagavata Purana. Written many hundreds of years ago, these stories reflect the myriad, complex emotions that surround a pair, either celestial or mortal, in love. The stories are woven in different hues, using a variety of threads, showing pure, romantic love, divine love, playful and joyous love, unrequited love, jealous love, mysterious love and tragic, sorrowful love. Though the lovers in each story travel down a difficult path and pass through many ordeals, finally, they always meet in a happy embrace either in this life or the next. As we read, they walk into the sunset in many different worlds.
We see the adulterous yet supremely divine, passionate love between Radha and Krishna. They meet secretly in quiet bowers, hidden from everyone's gaze, and recall how they had loved each other in earlier lives. Radha is not afraid and ventures out bravely at night to meet her divine lover. The love between Ram and Sita is pure and platonic while they are banished for fourteen years in the forest. A sad and forlorn Sita, far away from her beloved, pines away while Ram's heart aches for her. They can only talk to each other through the clouds and birds, and are fated to meet misfortune in their lifetime.
Love in separation is also the theme in various other love stories from the epics. The gorgeous demoness Hidimbi and the great warrior Bheema love each other with an undying passion, though they know they will soon be parted forever. King Shantanu too, spends a lifetime waiting for Ganga, his celestial love, to reappear, while Damayanti roams the forest all alone, crying for her lost husband Nala.
Vedas (1264)
Upanishads (527)
Puranas (642)
Ramayana (784)
Mahabharata (388)
Dharmasastras (175)
Goddess (545)
Bhakti (252)
Saints (1885)
Gods (1325)
Shiva (420)
Journal (181)
Fiction (71)
Vedanta (398)
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