Part B of the Epified Mahabharata Videos was again similar to what I viewed in Part A. The highlight fo the video were the illustrations and the clear succinct version of the story. It does make me wonder how long the illustrations took, and this may be another reason why the videos are relatively short. The video is much easier to understand than the Public Domain version as it does not use an older style of English. Watching the video version of the Mahabharata again brought to my attention how fortunate Pandu was to have a wife who could summon the gods. Ultimately, this was the only reason the story develops and brings Pandu back to relevance. This story line also brings to light how important all the curses or boons given in the past affected the future or led to plot lines in the epic. So much would not happen if these did not occur. The video also me want to research the practice of sati, which is where the widow sacrifices herself upon her dead husband's funeral pyre. I was interested in its origin and why they occurred. I found that there was some origins in Greek culture and that as tp why it developed was so that women could preserve their honor after their husbands passed away. Often times this was associated with warrior husbands and thus why honor was so important. It was interesting to see the concept but also good to see that it was no illegal in India. Ultimately the practice limited women's influence and independence and only contributed to gender disparities. Going back to the video, I am still waiting to see how the battle is portrayed, in particular the battle scenes. I probably will use Part C of the videos as a future reading.
Source: Epified: Mahabharata videos, Part B
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