Perhaps the grandest epic in the world, the Mahabharata has captured the imagination of generations. It is a lofty saga of conflict, changing morals, clash of eras, and exploring human values. Evolution of the Mahabharata and Other Writings on the Epic by S R Ramaswamy-the renowned scholar-journalist environmentalist from Karnataka-includes a translation of his 1972 classic Mahabharatada Belavanige and seven of his essays on various topics related to the Mahabharata and the Gita.

Evolution of the Mahabharata tells the story of the preparation of the Critical Edition of the Mahabharata by VS Sukthankar and his team at the Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute. It succinctly discusses the nature of the Mahabharata text, the problem of myriad manuscripts, the views of the Western scholars on the Epic, the method of preparing the Critical Edition, and the remarkable contribution of V S Sukthankar, among other things. This is one of the early books in an Indian language meant for the common reader to understand and appreciate the greatest scholarly undertaking of the twentieth century.

The present volume also includes insightful essays on: Vyasa, the author of the Epic; the famous Bharata-Savitri episode; the character of Bhisma; the Jnanesvari of Sant Jnanesvar; the unique position of the Gita and the reverence accorded to it.

These translations from the original Kannada contain many additional notes for the English reader, a detailed appendix with short biographical sketches of Indian and Western scholars associated with the Epic, and an index of all verses quoted in the book.

THE MATERIAL Constituting the lead chapter in this volume (Evolution of the Mahabharata) was written fifty-one years ago (1968) - in the first instance as a series of magazine articles. The other essays were occasion-driven and were published during the last couple of decades. One essay ('Bharata-Savitri') was written as recently as two months ago exclusively for the present volume. The lead chapter deals with text-critical aspects while the sequels explore a few thematic dimensions of the Epic.

The Prekshaa Pratishtana team have considered it worthwhile to retrieve these stray writings from oblivion and have addressed themselves to the difficult task of translating, editing, and shaping the corpus into a publishable form.

Rveda-vyasa throws his hands up in the air and yells out the truth to the people of the world but alas, no one is listening, no one cares. Perhaps the suggestion is that the eternal truth doesn't deserve to be handed out as a freebie; it needs to be realized by sustained rapas.

It wouldn't be incorrect to say that similar is the plight of scholars who have written in languages other than English. Simply because they chose to write in their mother tongue, be it Kannada or Marathi or Telugu-or even German, French, or Dutch-they went unnoticed, and at times deliberately kept aside. Sublime may be their writings, incisive their insights, unfathomable their depths, and unambiguous their presentation, but as far as the academic world is concerned, they picked the wrong language.

**Contents and Sample Pages**