Tuesday, May 23, 2017

Asoka and the Decline of the Mauryas by Romila Thapar

Here is another book which was pending since long. I think I should make the list, and start working (reading) on it.

Anyways, here is another book on historical figure, Asoka. This book is so fact based that it qualifies as a thesis or a research project. Plus this book is big. It's about 350 pages along with all the references. And I'll like to add that I never felt so good while going through the appendix, footnotes etc.

I believe that the historical figures can't be reported without an imagination, and supporting facts. Nobody can claim anything about such myths. Most probably there can be an educated construct around the fossils and remains but we never know when the bias of a viewer or writer will come into the picture, and distort the facts as their liking.

This book sound very unbiased because the author has mentioned that a lot of myths/stories about Asoka are created by those religious authors who wanted to show their religion in the best possible way, and these can't be taken as an evidence. There is so much contradiction between different accounts that we can't really conclude anything from these. There will always be a biased view if we take these stories as a fact.

This is a difficult book to read, and even I felt to leave it in between a lot of times. But as I mentioned this is full of facts and references this was never meant to be entertaining.

If you're interested to read an unbiased account of what would have Asoka been like than this is the book for you.