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Disorienting Dharma: Ethics and the Aesthetics of Suffering in the Mahabharata
Winner of the Award for Excellence in Textual Studies from the American Academy of Religion
This book explores the relationship between ethics, aesthetics, and religion in classical Indian literature and literary theory by focusing on one of the most celebrated and enigmatic texts to emerge from the Sanskrit epic tradition, the Mahabharata . This text, which is widely acknowledged to be one of the most important sources for the study of South Asian religious, social, and political thought, is a foundational text of the Hindu tradition(s) and considered to be a major transmitter of dharma (moral, social, and religious duty), perhaps the single most important concept in the history of Indian religions. However, in spite of two centuries of Euro-American scholarship on the epic, basic questions concerning precisely how the epic is communicating its ideas about dharma and precisely what it is saying about it are still being explored. Disorienting Dharma brings to bear a variety of interpretive lenses (Sanskrit literary theory, reader-response theory, and narrative ethics) to
examine these issues. One of the first book-length studies to explore the subject from the lens of Indian aesthetics, it argues that such a perspective yields startling new insights into the nature of the depiction of dharma in the epic through bringing to light one of the principle narrative tensions of the the vexed relationship between dharma and suffering. In addition, it seeks to make the Mahabharata interesting and accessible to a wider audience by demonstrating how reading the Mahabharata , perhaps the most harrowing story in world literature, is a fascinating, disorienting, and ultimately transformative experience.
This book explores the relationship between ethics, aesthetics, and religion in classical Indian literature and literary theory by focusing on one of the most celebrated and enigmatic texts to emerge from the Sanskrit epic tradition, the Mahabharata . This text, which is widely acknowledged to be one of the most important sources for the study of South Asian religious, social, and political thought, is a foundational text of the Hindu tradition(s) and considered to be a major transmitter of dharma (moral, social, and religious duty), perhaps the single most important concept in the history of Indian religions. However, in spite of two centuries of Euro-American scholarship on the epic, basic questions concerning precisely how the epic is communicating its ideas about dharma and precisely what it is saying about it are still being explored. Disorienting Dharma brings to bear a variety of interpretive lenses (Sanskrit literary theory, reader-response theory, and narrative ethics) to
examine these issues. One of the first book-length studies to explore the subject from the lens of Indian aesthetics, it argues that such a perspective yields startling new insights into the nature of the depiction of dharma in the epic through bringing to light one of the principle narrative tensions of the the vexed relationship between dharma and suffering. In addition, it seeks to make the Mahabharata interesting and accessible to a wider audience by demonstrating how reading the Mahabharata , perhaps the most harrowing story in world literature, is a fascinating, disorienting, and ultimately transformative experience.
276 pages, Paperback
First published December 19, 2012
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
May 7, 2024
This book is simply incredible. Accessible, passionately written, and theoretically brilliant. Hudson pulls together Sanskrit literary theory, narrative ethics, along with an implicit literary theory of the Mahābhārata to deliver a beautiful and moving interpretation of humanities greatest literary achievement.
May 22, 2025
In studying the Mahabharata and lessons for living, this is a valuable and insightful book that dives deeper into the complex reasons why the characters acts as they do, presenting how dharma is subtle and embracing its relationship to suffering.
It’s hard to comprehensively analyze the Mahabharata and this is the best I have seen.
I know I will read book again + some of the books referred in the bibliography.
It’s hard to comprehensively analyze the Mahabharata and this is the best I have seen.
I know I will read book again + some of the books referred in the bibliography.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews