Originally posted by: Darklord_Rehan
Obviously you haven't hurt my feelings any way. But actually I liked these ordinary saas-bahu fights, jealousy between wives, desire for admiration from the "man with ancient eyes" - I found them quite human unlike the ideal situations where these characters are presented as perfect and obedient and selfless people. However the Karna-Draupadi affair was stretched a bit, as though that was the main theme. But I liked Krishna very much. His subtlety, his philosophy wrapped in little quips, his walk on a thin line separating Divinity from Humanity - that is how I have personally imagined Krishna to be.
But as I said if you look for authenticity, or if you look at it as the Epic Mahabharat, obviously its unimpressive. Because Mahabharat is largely the tale of the Males of the society, written from the point of view of the men. We can't expect to get the same product if things are told from the POV of a female and that also somebody who's not directly present in 70% of the epic.
But please give me the names of some more novels if you can. It would be really a favour. I mainly download them in PDF format. I hate reading books as such.
See, I would not have minded these saas-bahu fights had they been more subtle. It kind of gets annoying when books, movies, and/or serials take them to another level and make it seem like all MILs and DILs are like that with each other. My cousins love their mothers-in-law, my aunts love their daughters-in-law, etc, and we also have to keep in mind that for us, fights and all are realistic because we live in the Kali Yuga, and though the people of Dwapar Yuga had more faults than the people of Treta Yuga, there were a LOT more ideal than people are now. DILs respected their MILs and learned to love them like their mothers, and MILs considered DILs like their real daughters and treated them with genuine affection. Of course, conflicts still existed as is evidenced by the Mahabharata, but we cannot attribute our Kali Yug faults to Dwapar Yuga and call that realistic. The problem with 'Palace of Illusions' is that it did not seem like a story of the Dwapar Yuga, but Kali Yuga. Where in the Mahabharata did it say that Kunti and Draupadi were constant rivals and hated each other? I cannot stand those kinds of embellishments because they totally destroy the characters.
One more thing, the beginning of Kali Yuga too was a lot more ideal than now, because my grandfather used to tell us a lot of stories about the kind of lifestyle he used to lead when he was a kid, and it was very strict and idealistic. Also, if you think about the great historical figures in our history, like Chanakya, Prithviraj Chauhan, Anand Math, etc, they were very ideal too compared to the political figures now....so saying the Palace of Illusions is like Mahabharata during Kali Yuga is wrong. It was like the Mahabharata during the 21st century.😆
Krishna's character in PoL was not that bad, but sometimes he did not seem serious enough, and though Shri Krishna in reality was the joking type, he also had his serious moments. But you're right, PoL's philosophical moments were great.👏
My problem is not that of the POV being of a female, I've read another story through Draupadi's POV and it was very much authentic to the events and characterization of Mahabharata...it seemed just like reading the Mahabharata through Draupadi's eyes, and there was another one with Kunti. I don't remember the exact titles, but I'll hunt them up and give them to you when I find them.
Edited by JanakiRaghunath - 14 years ago
253