New Delhi: A lecturer based in Britain has reimagined the ancient Indian epic Mahabharata from Duryodhana's perspective for Twitter audiences.
Chindu Sreedharan, a lecturer at Bournemouth University in the UK, began narrating the tale through the voice of one of the story's powerful warriors via thousands of 140-character bursts in 2009. His current attempt will be his second and will be shorter than his earlier version.
HarperCollins published his full story in December as a 276-page book, Epic Retold, and the sequel will tell the story using the Mahabharata's antagonist as a mouthpiece.
The ancient Sanskrit epic tells of a dynastic struggle for power and a cataclysmic war won by the righteous Pandava brothers.
India's first ‘Twitter fiction' was inspired by Japanese authors who have written books via text messages, so-called ‘cell phone novels,' but the genre is also well established around the world.
Sreedharan's plans for a sequel show the growing usage of Twitter in India. The micro-blogging network has also become an important tool for election campaigns and corporate communications.
When Mahabharata was adapted for television in 1980s, the streets used to be empty at the time of its telecast on Sunday mornings.
