The Great Indian Novel

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Winner of the Commonwealth Writers Prize for Best Book (Eurasia) and of the 1990 Federation of Indian Publishers Award for the Best Book. In this widely acclaimed novel, Shashi Tharoor has masterfully recast the two-thousand-year-old epic "The Mahabharata" with fictionalized - but highly recognizable - events and characters from twentieth-century Indian politics. Blending history and myth to chronicle the Indian struggle for freedom and independence, Tharoor directs his hilarious and often outrageous satire as much against Indian foibles and failings as against the bumblings of the British rulers. Despite its regional setting, this work can be enjoyed by readers unfamiliar with Indian history.