Although we acknowledge the impermanence of life at an intellectual level, a death, be it sudden or slow, is startling at an emotional level. For a while, we are shaken by shamshangyan, the realisation of death’s physical finality. Then, the rhythm of daily life reclaims us. As to which, an extraordinary death has stayed with us from the time Valmiki first told us of it in his Ramayana: the death of Jatayu. But first, a few points about the epics that may be of interest.
One, if you’d like to read a really close translation of Valmiki’s Ramayana in English, please see the historical one by Kamala Subramaniam. Read it slowly, one or two pages a day. Savour the flavour, read between the lines and make your discoveries. One minor discovery was that the bestselling book title Scion of Ikshvaku comes from her long-ago English rendition of Valmiki. Her translations of the Ramayana, Mahabharata and Srimad Bhagavatam may feel like they weigh half a ton each, but I like to have them nearby because you never know when you’re going to need to read a few pages, like a spa treatment for the mind.
Kamala Subramaniam’s English translation of Valmiki’s Ramayana came out in 1981, commissioned by the Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan. It is an abridged edition of the 24,000 verses that constitute the original, but it is a hefty 695 pages nonetheless. We need commitment to read it in today’s world, especially the longer descriptions and dialogues. But reading it can be a rewarding journey into the natural beauty of old India and the emotional landscape of the heart, including its dark corners.
Subramaniam chose to translate the Valmiki Ramayana last after completing Vyasa’s Mahabharata and Srimad Bhagavatam, for the Ramayana is uniquely challenging to tackle at a literary level. It is replete with poetry and emotional depth beyond even the magnificent Mahabharata.To get an idea of how monumental the task was, we need only think of the American Ramayana scholar Professor Robert Goldman. He and his team took 24 years to translate the 24,000 verses of Valmiki’s Ramayana. It was a labour of love, like Subramaniam’s, except that while Professor Goldman did a line-by-line translation of the verses, Subramaniam abridged it in prose for modern Indians without departing from Valmiki.
Subramaniam says in her preface, “Pain is the monochord heard throughout... the Ramayana is a threnody or lament filled to the brim with noble thoughts, noble sentiments and noble characters, not one of whom is spared the experience of pain.”
Beauty is the other bandwidth that we experience in Subramaniam’s translation. We see the enchanting India that Valmiki saw right from the opening scenes, with the limpid waters of the river Tamasa by which he lived. As we read on, we find exuberant descriptions of scented flowers, profusely blooming trees, clear lakes, great rivers like the Sarayu, Ganga, and Godavari, forests, and mountains, as well as humming bees and singing birds. An original line from Valmiki goes, “Chiribilvamadhuka cha vanjulavakulatathachampakatilaka cha evanagavriksha cha pushpita,” meaning “How charming they look blooming, the bilva and madhuka, and the vanjula (ashoka), vakula, champaka, tilaka and naga.”
The glowing impression of India’s pristine beauty that we get from this ancient book cannot but make us wistful. One of the effects this has had on me is that whenever I enter a forest, I always think of the ‘Three’, of Sita’s delicate feet bruised by thorns but her immense happiness nevertheless in her beautiful surroundings. She even tells Rama, “Let us stay on in the forest; let us not go back to Ayodhya.”
Incidentally, I was surprised to discover that people in the north have been led to believe that keeping a copy of the Mahabharata at home will cause family quarrels. As far as I know, nobody thinks so in the Deccan–not in Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Andhra, Telangana, Odisha, Gujarat, Goa and Maharashtra. On the contrary, besides keeping the Bharatam at home, a wood-inlay panel of the Parthasarathiyam or Krishna and Arjuna in the chariot is standard wall decoration in several Deccani homes. They see it as a representation, not of war but of the holy word. So, we may all keep the Mahabharata at home quite safely and peacefully. Indeed, the epics teach us to look closely at the dynamics of ego, power, and prestige to withstand life’s curveballs better. They remind us that it’s all small stuff compared to God-awareness.
Jatayu’s death makes this point with poignant irony in the Ramayana. What was Jatayu but a bird of prey? Yet, by virtue of his nobility, he dies with his head on Rama’s lap, looking into Rama’s face and murmuring Rama’s name. Rama cremates Jatayu with the Brahma Meda Samskaram, a special rite meant to honour a true scholar’s life of austerity, virtue, and dedicated study for the well-being of society. Whereas King Dasaratha, who performed elaborate rituals for an entire year to obtain sons, died pining, heartbroken for Rama.
Rama vows in Verse 330, Sarga (Chapter) 18 of the Yuddha Kandam of Valmiki’s Ramayana: “Sakradevamprappanaya ‘tavasmiiti ca yachate/ abhayamsarvabhutebhyodadamietadvrtam mama”, or “Those who seek refuge in me just once, saying ‘I am yours’, I assure him of safety against every kind of being; this is my vow.” So, it is that even today, Rama’s name is considered the Taraka Mantram, or ‘Mantra of the Great Crossing”, a source of eternal comfort when we die.
(Views are personal)
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Renuka Narayanan is senior journalist.