Week 3 Reading Diary 2: All's Well That Ends . . . Okay I Guess

As the title suggests, the ending of Narayan's Ramayana was both my favorite part, and the most infuriating end imaginable. I was engrossed for the epic battle scene in Lanka. Monkey's vs. Demons, the apocalyptic siege of a city of splendor. It was everything I wanted in a final battle. Rama and Ravana clashed with a fury of arrows and magical spells, a real page-turner.

Rama vs. Ravana: source

And then . . . Rama turns into a prick. He makes Sita put on her makeup before he sees her, he greets her in public, refuses to live with her even though she did nothing wrong. Maybe it's just my cultural bias, but seeing Rama sit idly by while Sita jumped into a fire, distraught with the idea of living without him, was sickening. Rama was never my favorite, in fact I found him to be a bland/boring character, but this legitimately made me dislike him.

Still though, besides their reunion, it was everything I wanted in an ending, and it even surprised me. I was not expecting Rama to treat Ravana with such compassion in the end. My one gripe with Narayan's style, however, was that it was more telling than showing. There were moments I wanted to see described in more detail, and which I was really curious about, that I felt were glossed over. I've decided to write about just such a moment for my storytelling post this week . . . stay tuned.