Customer Reviews

Ramayana

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I read this great poem when I was 14 years over the course of a year, every night, before I fell asleep. Widely regarded as one of the most sacred of Hindu epics, the Ramayana, attributed to the poet Valmiki, was written down during the first century A.D., although it was based on oral traditions from six hundred years earlier. The Ramayana is a moving love story with moral and spiritual themes that has deep appeal in India to this day.
The Ramayan traces the 14 years of exile of the crowned Prince of Ayodhya, Rama, because of a promise made by his Father, King Dasharat to one of his four wives, Kaykeyi. At Kayeki's behest, he must crown her son Bharat, a most virtuous Prince himself, as King and send Rama into the forest.
Rama the most virtuous of all, decides to take upon this penance for his Father's sake, and spends these years as an ascetic, living and fullfilling his deontological ethics, as instructed by his sacred gurus and sages. While in exile he befriends Hanuman, and together they fight one of the greatest wars of Indian history eventually mineralizing the Rakshas and their demon king Ravana.

This is an abridgement of the full Ramayana. The prose is beautiful, so poetic that it sticks in my memory long years after reading it. My favorite passages describe Jataayu's sacrificial defense of Seeta, and Hanuman's flight to search out for Seeta in Lanka.

This book is a consice and nice translation. No doubt about it, however if you are a looking for the comprehensive and more faithful translation, following book is recommended:

~ Ramayana: India's Immortal Tale of Adventure, Love and Wisdom - Krishna Dharma

It seems to be translated by someone for whom english isn't the mother tongue which I found charming. It's lovely how the stories unfold into each other. The story is basically about a conflict between Lord Rama and Ravanna, that's the pretext but it gives an intimate perspective of the Indian point of view.

I read this book first when I was 15 years old on a train in southern India and I liked the book so much that I must have read it thirty times atleast. Though I live in Canada now and miss home very much, I still hope to bring these tales to cinema one day. I strongly encourage a reading who wants to be transported to a world of adventure, heroism and virtue which seem to lack so much with people these days.

S. Subramanian Saskatoon, Canada.

C.Rajagopalachari is a patriot who faught for the independence of India. He represents the cream of Indian intelligentia. Above all he is a great story teller. The great epic Ramayana, told by a great story teller!

Please do not read this book like a novel. Put you heart and soul into it and read. Ravana in this story, is a personification of our weaknesses and vices. Rama is the embodiment of a perfect man while mother Seetha is none other than the omniscient power (shakthi) that runs this universe.

I grew up in India reading this edition since it was published by my alma mater. Rajaji's prose is priceless. His nuanced interpretation is par none. This is probably the best version of Ramayana available to the common person.
A note on the Kindle edition: The listing of the availability of Kindle edition of this book is incorrect. This book is not available on the Kindle yet. A different abridged version of Valmiki's Ramayana is what is available on the Kindle.

The book by Dr.C.Rajagopalachari , gives a glimpse of the life and times of Lord Rama , and it's refined and stylistic presentation has a wonderful relevance in the present day context of life at large and Spirituality in specific. A great book, enjoyable and cherishable by one and all.

I found this difficult to read, too many misspellings. I downloaded a free copy from [...] and it is much better.

Their FAQ states: "Why are there so many typos in my paperback?
We created your book using OCR software that includes an automated spell check. Our OCR software is 99 percent accurate if the book is in good condition. However, with up to 3,500 characters per page, even one percent can be an annoying number of typos. We would really like to manually proof read and correct the typos. But many of our books only sell a couple of copies so that would add hundreds of dollars to the cover price. And nobody wants to pay that. If you need to see the original text, you can download a copy for free."

This book by Dr.C.Rajagopalachari would certainly give a deep in sight in to this great indian epic.A great book and a must read for every one who wants to know Ramayana.