Operating in secrecy , Ravana befriended a hermit named Maricha who he knew had his own previous conflicts with Rama. Sharing a common enemy, the two devised a plan to overcome the mighty Rama.
Everyone who knew Rama knew that his love for Sita was a bond unlike any other. This love provided Rama with the strength to overcome any obstacle in order to ensure the safety of his beloved Sita. This exposed a weakness, and his foes began to scheme…
Ravana: Tell me, Maricha, what is one thing that you cherish above all else in this world?
Maricha: That is simple, my lord. Nothing could ever surpass the happiness my mother brought me.
Ravana: Precisely! Only a man cruel as Rama could deprive a man of his mother's love. We must do to him what he has done to you.
Maricha: I am sorry, but I do not follow.
Ravana: Tell me, what do you know about the tale of the Trojan Horse?
Maricha: Ah! A marvelous feat of intelligence. The Greeks, accepting defeat and returning to the shores of Greece, presented a mighty horse made of wood to the people of Troy. Or so it seemed.. The Trojans, drunk with pride, accepted the offering as a gift and a sign of victory. Little did they know, amid their revelry and ignorance, hid a small legion of Greek soldiers within the mighty horse. Once the time was right, the soldiers snuck out and opened the gates to their fellow Greeks who had returned under the cover of night. Once the gates were breached, the Greeks were easily able to overcome the Trojans.
Ravana: Exactly! In order to defeat Rama we must first breach the fortified gates of his heart, to which Sita holds the key.
Mericha: I don’t like where this is going, Ravana. Though it is true I have had my mishaps with Rama in the past, I wish for no man to experience the pain I felt when I lost my mother.
Ravana: Do you dare question my mission?! The choice is simple-aid in my quest to take down Rama, or stand in the way and fall by his side.
Mericha: No, no, great Ravana, I am with you.
Ravana: Good. Now, you are going to be my Trojan Horse. You will take the disguise of a golden deer to distract Rama and Lakshmana. A sight marvelous as this will surely mesmerize Sita. Unable to see her desires go unfulfilled, Rama will attempt to capture the beast, leading him out into the woods. Then all we need to do is lure his brother away. This will not be a difficult task. Once Sita is alone, I will easily snatch her up. We will take what is most precious to him when he least expects it, leaving the mighty Rama broken and exposed.
Sita and the Golden Deer: Wiki Commons
Author's Note: This
story is based off the episode of Ravana and Maricha from the Public Domain Ramayana. I chose
this style of writing because it highlights the tactical deception called upon
by Ravana. Just as the Greeks did in the Trojan War, Ravana constructed a thing
of beauty to help expose his enemy. In this case, Ravana would be the Greeks
while Rama represents the Trojans. More specifically, Rama's love for Sita
represents the gates of Troy, which will leave Rama crushed once this is
breached. There is a lot of detailed dialogue that takes place between Ravana and
Maricha in these stories so I borrowed this as an easy way to explain the relationship of this story to
the Trojan Horse. I chose this topic because the deception of the Trojan Horse
is something that the majority of people are familiar with. In this way, it
becomes easier for people who are not familiar with the Ramayana to
understand the workings of Ravana and his conniving, deceitful ways. While the Greeks are usually glorified for their use of the Trojan Horse, this provides a example of how it can inspire the workings of a villain like Ravana. This was
something that caught my attention early on. Ravana used Rama’s strongest
aspect, his love for Sita, as a way to bring him down. There is a lot of irony
in the situation and I think the Trojan Horse was a good parallel to help point
that out.
Bibliography: Public Domain Edition of Ramanaya Myths of the Hindu Buddhists by Sister Nivedita (1914) Ravana and Maricha
Oh my gosh, what a great idea for a story, Kurtis! As soon as I saw the title, I was hooked... but I did not expect Ravana and Maricha to actually be talking about the Trojan Horse, and using the lesson from that epic to accomplish their own wicked purposes here. INTENSE. And that makes so much sense: I love the idea of some kind of "mega-epic world" where all the characters would somehow be aware of one another, watching and learning from the other epic plots in order to achieve their own goals. How cool! Now I just need to get someone in the Myth-Folklore class to write a story about the Greek heroes sitting around the beaches outside Troy and using Rama as a hero to inspire their own efforts to rescue Helen...!
ReplyDeleteOn Friday afternoon I sometimes have time to pick some blogs to read at random, and I am glad that I happened to notice the title of your story. Excellent!
Happy Friday!
Hi Kurtis! I really enjoyed reading your story. It was really drama filled and I loved how you put a twist in the story from the original. I really like how you incorporated the trojan horse/deer in the story. I also like how you explained how the greeks used it and related it to the story of Ravana and Rama. I thought your story was well written and easy to follow. Great job!
ReplyDeleteIf there were a little person inside my brain like the little emotions in the new Disney movie, it would be jumping up and down at the mention of the Trojan horse! As a letters major, I have spent a ton of time pouring over the epics of Western antiquity, whereas these are a brand new adventure for me. I love the idea that these worlds are all somehow intertwined!
ReplyDeleteI also really enjoyed the way that you set up the text as dialogue. This story is easy to imagine on the stage!
Kurtis- what a clever idea to combine these two stories! I love how in your version, Ravana and Maricha were inspired by others in their scheming. I also loved your word choice. Words like: cherish, legion, and breached popped in your writing. The dialogue between Ravana and Maricha was easy to follow and contributed a lot to the story. I like how the reader was able to sense Maricha’s uneasiness at first. I think this is an important part of the plot, because it shows how feared Rama was by everyone. I noticed you used a different font for the story and the author’s note. I think that was a good idea because it created some separation between the two pieces of your post. I would have never thought to compare the golden deer to the Trojan horse, but in your story it made perfect sense! Great work, I look forward to seeing how the rest of your portfolio comes together.
ReplyDeleteKurtis!
ReplyDeleteI think that this was a good idea for a story. I think that for some men their weakness lies with their women. So I think that taking Sita away from Rama would hinder Rama and weaken him as a man. I loved how you added another aspect and included the story of the Trojan Horse, that added another dynamic to the story. I really liked the structure of your story, it made it easy to read and the flow of your story was good. I liked the descriptive you were in your story, because it made it easy to actually picture myself in your story. When you were talking about the Trojan Horse, I felt like I was one of the soldier on the horse. The way that you structured the dialog was different from other posts that I have seen and it made the dialog easy to decipher. Really Good Job with your first story for your portfolio.
The Trojan Deer. You immediately got my attention with that title. The combining of Greek and Indian stories is great! I’ve read something like this once already this semester and I enjoyed it very much. I see that you are showing this from a perspective where Rama is the bad guy. I like being able to read stories like this because I often play the “devil’s advocate” when my friends start arguing. Using Sita to get to Rama is also logical. Rama would definitely be conquered this way. I’m also glad that your story ended up using a deer as a trojan horse in terms of analogy instead of an actual deer filled with warriors like the story of the Trojan horse. Overall I enjoyed this story very much! I like the route you took for this one. Great job. I’m very curious as to how this plan would have ended up though. Rama is pretty intelligent and may know that it’s a trap!
ReplyDeleteHey Kurtis! I'm a fan of Greek mythology, and your combination was very well done! The contrasts and comparisons between the two stories are not to be ignored. It's funny, truly, how often tales and epics like this will intertwine in their themes! Even if the plot doesn't often line up, I think tales like this are often used sort of as parables, but regardless have a moral to show or teach, and thus show up as similar. I really like how metaphorical Ravana was--the Trojan Horse was a physical object that got soldiers through enemy gates, but Ravana's ability to translate this into something that applies to human emotion was great! I also really like your reasoning to mix the two of these up. It does help explain what Ravana's thoughts are, and potentially why Rama went to chase after the deer in the first place, which seems like an odd lapse of judgement. Great job, Kurtis!
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