For over a century, Abanindranath Tagore’s Raj Kahini has been among the most beloved works of Bangla literature. Mixing history and mythology with an extraordinary visual imagination, it tells the tales of the Suryavamsha – the Sun Dynasty that ruled Mewar. Here we meet Shiladitya, child of Sun God; Bappaditya, who builds an empire that stretches up to Persia; Hambir, the cheeky teenager who reclaims the of Mewar. We meet Padmini, the princess from Sri
Lanka who becomes a goddess; Mirabai, who renounces her kingdom to be with her child-god, Nandalala.
On every page, we are exposed to emotions that define the human condition – love, sacrifice, jealousy, courage, greed and treachery. Honour and loyalty clash with villainy and evil, and the better side does not always win. Epic in their sweep, universal in their essence, the stories are timeless. Suryavamshi is a translation and adaptation of Abanindranath’s classic for twenty-first-century India.
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