Reading Notes: Sita, Daughter of the Earth Part A

Sita: Daughter of the Earth, Pages 1-45
Main Characters: Sita, Rama, Lakshamana,
POV: The Ramayana from Sita's perspective

Cover Image of Sita: Daughter of the Earth, by Saraswati Nagpal. Source: Printed Graphic Novel

• In the beginning, Sita tells her origin story as the daughter of the earth goddess, Bhudevi, blessed to the king and queen of Videha. **At a young age, Sita is able to move the bow of Shiva which is said to be heavier than any warrior could ever move as it was imbued with Shiva's magic (suggesting her divine origin; interesting enough in this version Sita also seeks a different life first to become a warrior, but her father turns her down "Sita you are as delicate as a flower"*). While her sister (Urmila) and cousins take part in the arts as princess, she grows up interested scholarly work and philosophy, loving stories of important female characters:
• Uma, daughter of Himavan, consort of Shiva and thus incarnation of Parvati the second reincarnation of Shiva's wife

Parvati with her husband Shiva, the destroyer and their son Ganesha. Source: Flickr

• Princess Savitri, granted more life for her husband by impressing the god of death, Yama
• Ma Anasuya, a yogini, who Sita will later meet while in exile with Rama
• Gargi, a female philosopheSita has a great connection to Bhudevi (who of course in this version, is her actual mother; "I often felt her statue come alive and saw her smile at me like a benevolent mother).
• In this version, Sita is the one who proposes that her would be hubby need to lift the bow of Shiva in order to win her hand; a great many people gather for the swayamvara (this gave Sita more power over her own story)

Rama breaks Shiva's bow. Source: Europeana Collections

• She meets Rama before this and is immediately enthralled; when the ceremony begins Rama is the only one who can lift the bow and actually breaks it; both she and her 'sisters' are betrothed to the princes from Ayodhya and are married
• A time passes while they are all happily living in Ayodhya, Sita with her hubby Rama, when the king decided that he must crown a successor- Rama
• Here the plot of Kaikeyi and her two boons unfolds, here the woman who convinces her of what she must do is named Manthara; here again, Rama is banished and Bharatha is to be crowned at the request of Kaikeyi.
• Sita stubbornly says she will join Rama as his loyal wife; Lakshamana accompanies them as well leaving Urmila, Sita's sister and his wife, in Ayodhya; they go into the forest to begin their exile for fourteen years and the kingdom is heartbroken; the king dies of heartbreak; even when Baratha comes to the forest to tell the company of this, Rama refuses to go back.
• At the end of Part A, Rama and Lakshamana have just defeated their first rakshasa foe, and Rama has saved Sita (*here Sita is actually a ' damsel in distress' as she is captured by the rakshasa, and says she wasn't made for battle; I think given her strong willed character for most of the story this was strange; her devotion to being just the wife of a prince given all of her other brave and strong qualities in the way she was painted was interesting).

The marriage of Sita and Rama (Lithograph). Source: Europeana Collections

*I decided to include many images for these notes because they were based on a graphic novel that had really beautiful artwork and I hoped to recreate the multiple images that accompanied the story with my notes.

Reference: Saraswati Nagpal, Sita: Daughter of the Earth [Graphic Novel; Print].