NEW BOOK
Bhagavad Gita - Translated by Mani Rao. (Penguin Books India, 2011. India edition)
REVIEWS:
Mani Rao’s courageous approach to the Gita not only revitalizes an ancient philosophy but also restores power and majesty to the text’s poetry.
–Arshia Sattar
Mani Rao brings a felicitous mix of textually informed vigilance and playful irreverence to bear on her translation of the Bhagavad Gita. With its contemporary musicality and relaxed tone, Rao’s version opens up this central text of modern Hinduism for a new generation of readers.
– Ranjit Hoskote
Bhagavad Gita - A translation of the poem. (Autumn Hill Books, 2010. USA/Canada edition)
REVIEWS:
“The great virtue of The Bhagavad Gita is courage, and in her luminous new translation, Rao is courageous indeed. Her lines venture to keep pace with the original, stride for stride, revelation for revelation. As Wittgenstein wrote, ‘courage is always original.” I can avow that Rao’s is the first truly original version of this sacred text to appear in decades.”
– Donald Revell
“Mani Rao has transformed the most famous spiritual poem in India to a multi-layered poem, giving shapes to multiple meanings and sounds to multiple forms. Just as Arjuna saw the universe in Krishna’s mouth and like the endless tree, the tree of life, which reveals its roots above and leaves below, Mani Rao has shown us this universe, this endless life with its supporting philosophy, as a poem to be perceived directly, intuitively, cutting through reason and linearity to arrive at the underlying undying poetry and grace of this epic work.”
– Frederick Smith
- Read excerpts, translator’s note, and essay in eXchanges (Winter 2009).
- Read interview in Full Tilt (March 2011).
- Print Pick in The Hindu, Dec 12, 2011. For more reviews see Press
