[EN][ Along the Ganga River]

" The religious and cultural life of the chole of the Indian subcontinent and much of the rest of Asia has been deeply influenced by the two great epic poems of Hinduism, the Mahabharata and the Ramayana. Putting aside all question of their merits as literature, which by any standard are very high, they are among the most important poems in the wold. Of the two the Mahabharata is in essence the olderm its nuclear story having been transmitted from the shadowy period following the composition of the Rig Veda, the oldest literature of India. A few of the names of rulers, sages and priests mentioned in the Mahabharata also occur in sources of the later Vedic period, and the story of the epic may have developed around traditions of a great battle which took place about 900 B.C.

The plot of the Mahabharata is a complicated one. Like the Greek stories of the Trojan war out of which emerged the Iliade, and like the cycle of Germanic myth and legend which crystalized into the Nibelungenlied, the Indian epic tells of a bitter quarrel which developed into a war of extermination' The five sons of Pandu are unjustly deprived of their ancestral kingdom by their wicked cousins, the Kauravas, and they regain it after a tremendous battle in which all their enemies and most of their friends are slain. Echoes of a heroic age are heard throughout the narrative portions of the epicm and the martial values of bravery, loyalty and truthfulness are much encouraged. Heroes and villains alike never refuse challenges, whether to battle, to contests of skills, or to game of chance, and few major characters are guilty of serious cowardice. The atmosphere of the main narrative is that of a society just emerging from tribalism, in which personal loyalty to one's chief and fellow clansmen is still very strongly emphasized. But the Mahabharata as we have it contains more than the poetic account of a legendary war. It is replete with interpolations of all kinds, which were obviously introduced long after the main narrative was composed."*

"The Ramayana and the Mahabharata, though born in India, belong to the "collective dream" of all of South East Asia. The epics are reborn at every age, their message renewed, their forms changing as the course of history changes, fructifying and revififying and filling the human spirit. they have charmed and enchanted, inspired and exalted the people of India and South Asia, forming the very foundation of their rich and living culture. the epics are history, myth and folklore, and the ageless quality of their appeal, the influence of the moral, ethical and religious values they contain have shaped the daily lives of millions of men and woman for generations [...] Both epics were transmitted orally for centuries before being written down, but even today wandering minstrels and ballad singers travel regularly from village to village throughout India and other countries of South Asia reciting and singing the epics far into the night under the stars. Indian working-men, wearied with the toil of the night seated in a circle round the fire listening attentively to a drama of three thousand years ago."**

sources :

* Courier "The Ramayana and the Mahabharata two great epics of Asia", december 1967, Arthur L. Basham, Professor of asian Civilization at the Australian National University, Canberra, **Courier "The Ramayana and the Mahabharata two great epics of Asia", december 1967, Anil De Silva of Ceylon