Book Name: All lies says Krishna
Author: J. Rajasekharan Nair
Publisher: Fingerprint
Genre: Fiction
Rating: 4/5
Book Blurb: Its thirty-six years after the Great War of Kurukshetra. The curse of a bereaved mother has deprived Krishna of everything, except his life. And so he journeys to Vrindavan, the village of his innocence, to spend the concluding hours of his life with his childhood friend and lover, Radha. In her presence, Krishna peels off the layers of myth that portrayed him as the incarnation of God. And at her request, he retells the story of the Mahabharata, like you have never heard before. All lies, says Krishna is an emotional journey into the tortured inner universe of its central characters, focussing more on their flailings than on their heroism. A charismatic retelling of the Mahabharata, this compellingly told narrative has a distinctive voice which sets it apart from anything you have ever read.
Review: All Lies Says Krishna is a retelling of the Mahabharata epic. The tale takes place many years after the great battle of Kurukshtera and is told primarily as a conversation between Krishna and Radha.
The book is written in simple language and is told from multiple view points. The Mahabharata has been told and re-told in many forms and it is not always easy to do justice to such an epic tale but the author has managed to narrate it in such a manner that does not come across as boring.
“Radha, a woman is inside the great prison of womanhood and motherhood. If she tries to escape, the prison would imprison her. If the prison declares freedom from her, she would cling to it.”
This book serves as a good starting point for beginners and laymen who have little knowledge about the Mahabharata. Such books help to generate interest in the original epics.
The unique point of this book is that it also discusses some not so famous plots from the main epic. These clarifications and answers result from questions posed by Radha. However, this has also resulted in exaggeration- something which could have been avoided. But the thing to remember here is that the story does not necessarily need to conform to the original epic as it is a retelling from the point of the view of the author.
Lesser known stories and viewpoints perhaps not elaborated so much in the main tale also get primacy here.