Introduction: characters (cont.) :

Bhim

Bhim is the muscle that we all wish to have by our side. The emotionally vulnerable, simple (almost innocent) bulldozer that is ready to take on the world for his brothers.

True, he is not the brightest of the warriors. He excelled at mace fighting but even there he was not a very tactical or skillful fighter, the weaknesses that Duryadhan exploited in fighting him. However, his size and strength did seem to make up for  what he lacked in efficiency most of the time.

In appearance Bhim is huge, not exactly obese but not an well toned body either. From more detailed description it seems Bhim had a moon face, lack of facial hair and Incredibly long arms ( OK, now I am inclined to think he had hypogonadism. :/ ). 

Bhim killing Jarasandh, the king of Magadh.

Bhim is the bully. Among all the other events leading to the great war Bhim's treatment to his uncle Dhritarashtra's sons can't be overlooked. Bullying the cousins as a child may seem to be pretty harmless, but it definitely didn't help the the cousins bond the way Yudhisthir or any other elder would have wanted. 

But still Bhim is the loyal and honest at heart who lived by the simple rule of loving those who love him and crushing those who decided to be his enemy. Some find him too emotionally vulnerable. Though I myself used the same term for him at the very beginning, I do feel that the way it is meant is usually insulting and intends to make him look stupid. Today in our world where we have so many problems rising from hollow over smartness that only aims at shifting every responsibility to the next available shoulder from their's and finds meaning only in pointlessly criticizing anything and everything they ever come across, I think the world would be better off without the lot of them and with a few like Bhim who may not be the brightest but who are honest in what they believe and who actually get some work done. 

That's it for now. Will come back asap for more. Happy reading.

Introduction: Characters

Before I start with the story of the Mahabharata, I'd like to share some basic outline about the key characters in the way I have imagined them. I think this will help the readers to understand my version of the story better since It's being told through these characters. They are the ones who narrate the entire story in bits and parts and since there are no such thing as an unbiased narrator I think a basic introduction about the characters are important.

Yudhisthir

Yudhisthir is the hero of the Mahabharata. It is his story. He is the reflection of us, common people, who are not as outstanding warrior as Arjun, nor possess the monstrous strength of Bhim, goes through moral dilemma regarding the choices we have to make. 

A friend once told me, "how can you say Yudhisthir is the reflection of common man? There's nobody who are so truthful."

Very true, but in my opinion, like morality truth is also relative. Stating mere facts is not always telling the truth. It's like Stephen Fry once said," We want to tell the truth but facts come in the way."

If we look at Yudhisthir's character we see the good king, the troubled human, the hopeless gambler, impressionable commoner...

The game of dice

But above all these what really makes him the hero is the fact that he has to take his own decisions. Vidur, Krishna and all his counsel men at best can only give him suggestions, at the end of the day he is the one who has to take the decision. The decisions that will decide his future, the future of his brothers and the future of his world and like us he is confused when it comes to take a decisions, like us sometimes he makes decisions out of compulsion against his will, like us he feebly tries to defend them against strong opposition of the decision... and in the very end it is he who has to face the ultimate dilemma when he sees his own brothers are in hell and all that he fought against in his life is there to greet him at the gate of heaven.

However, having said this, I must remind that I am about to tell the story in multiple narrative and in each narrative the narrator have their own views and thoughts about the characters and above all, like we all love to believe that we are the hero of our own story the characters in here are no different. In their world, their story they are all heroes... in their own way. In an epic there are different levels of battles the character goes through, and I believe in someway every character in the Mahabharata becomes a hero at some point of time, irrespective of their ultimate motives.

Unfortunately that's all for now, will come back as soon as possible, do share your views about the blogs at the comment box below. Happy reading.

disclaimer

This is to inform my reader that the posts in this blogs are going to be about my views on the Mahabharata and that these views are completely personal and are absolutely not intended to hurt any religious sentiments. Being amused by the great Indian epic for about 8 years now I just want to share my thoughts about the Mahabharata you are absolutely welcome to share your likes or dislikes or even hatred. In fact I am inclined to insist my readers that they do share their thoughts. However, just a suggestion I have taken help of several theories regarding the development of the characters which are not necessarily proven to be true so I will suggest that my readers take my writing as purely a work of fiction and the claims made in the posts should at no point be considered as work of proven research.

Anyway, I hope you all enjoy it. Just keep an open mind.

Happy reading.