This was by far my least favorite set of readings. It felt so long-winded and unnecessary. I know that there are many myths and epics that have some tragedy in it. However, this story felt somewhere between a happy-ending and a tragedy all at the same time in a weird way. The battle was okay in my opinion. It just took Rama his various blessings and weapons along with Hanuman to gain his victory. It was pretty cliche but I was okay with it. The only thing that I found confusing was why the God of Fire who I'm guessing was supposed to be helping Rama has granted Indrajit a brahma weapon.
The bad parts of the story comes after the war. I understand that Rama had no choice to act the way he did in order to help Sita prove her innocence in such an extreme way. However, I thought that this was a needless twist and cruelty after all that Sita's been through. Also, maybe I would have come to terms with it if that was the end of it but Rama had to end up sending Sita into exile once again after he returned to his kingdom. Did a king really have so little control over his people that the so called "public outrage" caused him to do such injustice to his wife? Who was also apparently with his children. The kicker came when her exile was finally supposed to end and she returns to being her true self as Lakshmi. Maybe that was the only way for the story to have closure since Rama and Sita were both supposed to be Gods anyways, but if it's a mythological story, they could have made up some better way to do so in my opinon. The ending just felt like a series of back-handed slaps to me and it was disappointing to say the least.
Bibliography
Ramayana, The Epic of Rama, Prince of India, by Romesh Dutt (1899).
Indian Myth and Legend by Donald A. Mackenzie (1913)
Myths of the Hindus and Buddhists by Sister Nivedita (1914)
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