Week 4 Reading Diary B: Servants and Sages and Gods, Oh My!

So, that title is a bit cheesy and, I think, merits an explanation: there are so many more characters in this version than in Narayan! To add to the difficulty, they are very unfamiliar names to an English-speaking reader. So, it is a bit difficult to keep all the names apart and remember who everyone is. It doesn't help that in this version Kooni is called Manthara - that was a bit discombobulating. Though I appreciate the greater detail in this version, it is a harder read and easy to get bogged down in all the names and characters.

The narrative seemed a bit slower in this section, though I guess it was similar in Narayan, just not as noticeable. There also seemed to be less unfamiliar material here, which helped a bit to get through the narrative. The main story of Kaikeyi and Dasaratha and Rama's leaving seemed pretty much the same, although in this version Dasaratha's death isn't as sudden or dramatic. I kind of preferred Narayan's version; it was perhaps a bit melodramatic, but I liked it.

Some new material here came in the middle of this narrative, when Rama meets some people in the forest. They meet Guha, who has his own god-story to tell, and then they meet a sage named Bharadwaja, who I'm pretty sure wasn't mentioned in Narayan.

Overall, I guess, this section was pretty similar to Narayan, but it was still pretty slow. There's just not much action in this part of the story, though, and I'm sure it'll pick up real soon. I'm hoping then there will be more detail to answer some of the questions and curiosities Narayan left me with.