Book Review #27: Sita - An Illustrated Retelling of the Ramayana By Devdutt Pattanaik

This is yet another good book by my favorite mythological author Devdutt Pattanaik. We might have heard many versions of Ramayana's till today from our parents, teachers, grandparents, friends, colleague, etc.. But, this book stands class apart. This book tries to give us the various details of Ramayana not only a regular Valmiki Ramayana as in practice, but various versions of Ramayana that have been foretold around the world. It even includes the plays and folklore tales through which Ramayana has been passed on from generations to generations.

As I finished reading the book. Not only many of my questions have been answered. But also, many of the misconceptions have also been demystified. It is certainly a well researched book.

I am not going to give you all a regular review of the Ramayana. As most of us know the overall story, at least the overall Ramayana happenings. Instead, I will mention only those things, which I found worth to be noted in my review.

Sita:
First and foremost, the character Sita. She is one of the main protagonists of Ramayana. Is that enough to be known.? Certainly not. This book gives us the various traits of Sita and her tryst with the entire Ramayana. She is a well educated, well versed woman, full of wisdom, love and courage. She assesses the situation from her own point of view. We all admonish Rama as a bad person when he sent out Sita to the woods after their 14 years of exile, by questioning her chastity. But, in this book, Sita assesses her situation from Rama's point of view and she was happy to go!!. She tries to reason with her situation and comes to a conclusion. At sometimes you may feel, Sita is more mature than Rama in terms of actions, decisions and what not. I can say it aloud that, from this book, my respects for Sita has been multi folded.

Hanuman:
Another character worth to be noted is of Hanuman, the monkey god. He was the greatest devotee of Rama that mankind ever came to know. He actually teared down his chest to show the world that his lord, Sri Rama resides in his heart. But, that is not enough. He is full of knowledge and wisdom. He is a vedic scholar. The main section of the book, where Hanuman sets out to find Sita in Lanka. And, when he finds out Sita, the dialogues between them is a treat to read from the book. It is captured in such a fashion by the author that, you actually feel, this might have happened for real between Sita and Hanuman.


Hanuman the funny side: 
A funny incident which I would like to mention here. When Rama's 14 years of exile was over and they come back to Ayodhya. During Rama's coronation ceremony. Sita gifts Hanuman a pearl necklace for his help to fight Ravana. As Hanuman receives the necklace, he starts to bite every pearl and throw all the pearl one by one. Surprised Sita asks Hanuman why he was doing such things?. For which, Hanuman replied, "I was finding Rama in each of those pearls, and I threw it one by one after checking there was no Rama in it!!". This shows us that Hanuman's unconditional love for his master, lord, Sri Rama.

Hanuman the "generous":
It so happened after all the Ramayana tales that. Valmiki, supposed to be the original Ramayana writer was about to complete his writing of Ramayana. Then suddenly, a voice from the space told him that, Hanuman's version of Ramayana is better than yours. Saddened Valmiki thought no one will read his version of Ramayana. So he meets Hanuman and borrows Hanuman's version of Ramayana. To his astonishment, it was indeed a better version than his. So, Valmiki told Hanuman that, "Your version is way better than mine. And, no one will read my version of Ramayana". By hearing this, Hanuman tore down his version of Ramayana once and for all. Surprised Valmiki asks Hanuman, "Why you did that, your version was better than mine!!". Then, Hanuman replied "I wrote Ramayana because, I didn't want to forget my Rama and all those days I spent with him. You expect your version of Ramayana to reach to public, hence your Ramayana deserves to be saved than mine!!". This again shows us that, Hanuman is not just a mere monkey, but above all a generous, wisdomful person, who rose to be a godly figure.

Ravana:
When it comes to Ravana, there was no greater details in the book. As this book mainly focuses on Sita. Still, author had covered Ravana in greater detail and let his readers amuse by reading the knowledge and power that Ravana has possessed. The interesting section arrives when Ravana was shot by an arrow and he was about to leave his physical body. Rama asks Lakshmana to go and learn all the possible things from the greatest brahmana Ravana to gain his knowledge. When Lakshmana was not so welcomed by this idea. Rama himself will go to Ravana and lay down in front of him and asks him to educate him by his vast knowledge. This shows us that, even when you are fighting with your enemy, respect your enemy for his knowledge!!

Not only these tales that the author wrote, he also mentions the cycles of the Yugas and its a repeating phenomenon. Thereby, justifying his writing that, there may be thousands of Ramayana's that have happened in this never ending cycles of Yugas. As per the author, the 4 yugas (4 - Kritha Yuga), (3 - Treta Yuga), (2 - Dwapara Yuga) and the final one (1- Kali Yuga) that marks the end of the Yugas as proclaimed by Brahma. And this cycle repeats from Krita Yuga again. So, there are possibilities that, there may be many many Ramayana's happened that can't be imagined by humans.

This kind of surprising things are lot to find in this book. As a signature writing of Pattanaik, even in this book, he has produced some of the modern age practices that were directly linked to the practices that were followed in the Ramayana times. He also traces some of the modern places that can be directly or indirectly linked to the ancient Ramayana tales.

I would highly recommend this book to everyone. It surely helps you to gain and expand your knowledge on Ramayana.

My Rating:
5/5