MAHABHARATA CONDENSED INTO ENGLISH ... - Mandhata Global

It would be too much to assume that even with the help of this similarity in metres, I have
been able to transfer into my English that sweep and majesty of verse which is the charm
of Sanscrit, and which often sustains and elevates the simplest narration and the plainest
ideas. Without the support of those sustaining wings, my poor narration must often plod
through the dust; and I can only ask for the indulgence of the reader, which every
translator of poetry from a foreign language can with reason ask, if the story as told in the
translation is sometimes but a plain, simple, and homely narrative. For any artistic
decoration I have neither the inclination nor the necessary qualification. The crisp and
ornate style, the quaint expression, the chiselled word, the new-coined phrase, in which
modem English poetry is rich, would scarcely suit the translation of an old Epic whose
predominating characteristic is its simple and easy flow of narrative. Indeed, the Mahabharata
would lose that unadorned simplicity which is its first and foremost feature if the
translator ventured to decorate it with the art of the modern day, even if he had been
qualified to do so.
For if there is one characteristic feature which distinguishes the Maha-bharata (as well as
the other Indian Epic, the Ramayana) from all later Sanscrit literature, it is the grand
simplicity of its narrative, which contrasts with the artificial graces of later Sanscrit
poptry. The poetry of Kalidisa for instance, is ornate. and beautiful, and almost
scintillates with similes in every verse; the poetry of the Maha-bharara is plain and
unpolished, and scarcely stoops to a simile or a figure of speech unless the simile comes
naturally to the poet. The great deeds of godlike kings sometimes suggest to the poet the
mighty deeds of gods; the rushing of warriors suggests the rushing of angry elephants in
the echoing jungle; the flight of whistling arrows suggests the flight of sea-birds; the
sound and movement of surging crowds suggest the heaving of billows; the erect attitude
of a warrior suggests a tall cliff; the beauty of a maiden suggests the soft beauty of the
blue lotus. When such comparisons come naturally to the poet, he accepts them and notes