TheCurse of Gandhari

A retelling of the Mahabharata is always of immense interest to general readers and those particularly interested in mythology.Gandhari is a very important character in the Mahabharata but relatively less explored and understood - her story is stunningly narrated in this book.Continues the excellent legacy of imagining and understanding mythological characters as done by bestselling writers like Devdutt Patnaik and Chitra Banerjee in recent times.Aditi Banerjee is a practicing attorney at a Fortune 500 financial services company. She co-edited the book, Invading the Sacred: An Analysis of Hinduism Studies in America. She has published several essays on Hinduism and the Hindu-American experience in publications such as Outlook India and Swarajya. She earned a Juris Doctor from Yale Law School and received a B.A. in International Relations, magna cum laude, from Tufts University.Gandhari, the blindfolded queen-mother of the Kauravas, sees through it all. Gandhari has one day left to live. As she stares death in the face, her memories travel back to the beginning of her story, to life's unfairness at every point: A fiercely intelligent princess who wilfully blindfolded herself for the sake of her peevish, visually-impaired husband; who underwent a horrible pregnancy to mother one hundred sons, each as unworthy as the other; whose stern tapasya never earned her a place in people's hearts, nor commanded the respect that Draupadi and Kunti attained; who even today is perceived either as an ingratiatingly self-sacrificing wife or a bad mother who was unable to control her sons and was, therefore, partly responsible for the great war of the Mahabharata. In this insightful and sensitive portrayal, Aditi Banerjee rescues Gandhari from being reduced to a mere symbol of her blindfold. She builds her up, as Ved Vyasa did, as an unconventional heroine of great strength and iron will - who, when crossed, embarked upon a complex relationship with Lord Krishna, and became the queen who cursed a God.An incisive and insightful look at a lesser-known woman of the Mahabharata.Editor's Pick for October 2019The most interesting part of the book...is the relationship between Gandhari and Krishna. Banerjee explores the duality of the power hierarchy between the two - Krishna is Gandhi's junior in relation, but she is the devotee and the Lord. The shifting nature of their equation is skillfully examined.Women in the Mahabharata have often been misunderstood as passive and non-reactive, which now stands rightfully challenged through creative retelling and interpretation of their choices. This narrative also reveals to us that during that time each woman, possessing a strong individuality and an equally strong viewpoint, had the complete freedom to do what they wanted to do - their choices were independent of the positions of power their families held.The blindfolded queen, mother of the Kauravas in the Mahabharata, is built up in this book as an unconventional heroine of strength and strong will.