Enjoy fast, free delivery, exclusive deals, and award-winning movies & TV shows with Prime
Try Prime
and start saving today with fast, free delivery
Amazon Prime includes:
Fast, FREE Delivery is available to Prime members. To join, select "Try Amazon Prime and start saving today with Fast, FREE Delivery" below the Add to Cart button.
Amazon Prime members enjoy:- Cardmembers earn 5% Back at Amazon.com with a Prime Credit Card.
- Unlimited Free Two-Day Delivery
- Streaming of thousands of movies and TV shows with limited ads on Prime Video.
- A Kindle book to borrow for free each month - with no due dates
- Listen to over 2 million songs and hundreds of playlists
- Unlimited photo storage with anywhere access
Important: Your credit card will NOT be charged when you start your free trial or if you cancel during the trial period. If you're happy with Amazon Prime, do nothing. At the end of the free trial, your membership will automatically upgrade to a monthly membership.
-23% $38.48$38.48
Ships from: Amazon.com Sold by: Amazon.com
$36.45$36.45
Ships from: Amazon Sold by: Dream Books Co.
Download the free Kindle app and start reading Kindle books instantly on your smartphone, tablet, or computer - no Kindle device required.
Read instantly on your browser with Kindle for Web.
Using your mobile phone camera - scan the code below and download the Kindle app.
OK
Hanuman's Tale: The Messages of a Divine Monkey Paperback – January 11, 2007
Purchase options and add-ons
Lutgendorf also offers a rich array of entertaining stories not previously available in English: an expanding epic cycle that he christens the "Hanumayana." Arguing that Hanuman's role as cosmic "middle man" is intimately linked to his embodiment in a charming and provocative simian form, Lutgendorf moves beyond the Indian subcontinent to interrogate the wider human fascination with anthropoid primates as boundary beings and as potent signifiers of both Self and Other.
- Print length448 pages
- LanguageEnglish
- PublisherOxford University Press
- Publication dateJanuary 11, 2007
- Dimensions9.2 x 1.07 x 6.58 inches
- ISBN-100195309227
- ISBN-13978-0195309225
Frequently bought together
Customers who viewed this item also viewed
Editorial Reviews
Review
About the Author
Product details
- Publisher : Oxford University Press; 1st edition (January 11, 2007)
- Language : English
- Paperback : 448 pages
- ISBN-10 : 0195309227
- ISBN-13 : 978-0195309225
- Item Weight : 1.4 pounds
- Dimensions : 9.2 x 1.07 x 6.58 inches
- Best Sellers Rank: #663,782 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #1,546 in Hinduism (Books)
- Customer Reviews:
About the author
Discover more of the author’s books, see similar authors, read author blogs and more
Customer reviews
Customer Reviews, including Product Star Ratings help customers to learn more about the product and decide whether it is the right product for them.
To calculate the overall star rating and percentage breakdown by star, we don’t use a simple average. Instead, our system considers things like how recent a review is and if the reviewer bought the item on Amazon. It also analyzed reviews to verify trustworthiness.
Learn more how customers reviews work on Amazon-
Top reviews
Top reviews from the United States
There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later.
several accounts of his greatness, how his influence reaches beyond india, to many peolple
in other lands, and I can tell you that I personally know of disciples in honduras and colombia!
The book aproach his subject with respect and tell us many of his facets, if you are new to the
greatness of hanuman ji or an old devotee, this book has it all...
...This long-awaited monograph by Philip Lutgendorf, a Professor of Hindi and Modern Indian Studies at the University of Iowa, is a result of more than a decade of focused research by one of the leading American scholars in the field. It capitalizes on a series of papers he published between 1994 and 2004, recasting them into a seamless body that has all the prerequisites to become `The Book' on Hanuman in English (although the author disclaims such adoration right from the beginning).
...Hanuman, a simian aide-de-camp to Rama, the main human hero of the epic Ramayana, has evolved into one of the most popular Hindu folk-deities. In the experience and practice of Indian people, particularly in the north, he is the most endearing character, a preeminent "deity-of-choice of the kali yuga". However, in spite of the fact that nowadays one can find in India far more shrines dedicated to him than to Rama, this Hanuman's rise to prominence is a relatively recent phenomenon.
....The "popular" nature of the Hanuman-cult spread largely by the word of mouth requires one to look far beyond the ancient authoritative text and elite practices. Lutgendorf examines Sanskrit and vernacular texts, classical iconography as well as popular mass culture, and complements this theoretical research by extensive fieldwork and interviews. He applies deconstructive and gender-conscious approach combined with critique of Orientalism to arrive at many a thought-provoking conclusion.
...The author's investigation is interwoven with a very fundamental question: Why would human beings adore a "lower" species? What does the divine monkey convey to devotees about the world, the gods, and about themselves? The answer is rather complex but Lutgendorf patiently deciphers Hanuman's messages one by one in eight chapters of his book.
...First, Hanuman's carreer is examined along with some of the theories regarding his origin and expanding popularity. The divine monkey first appeared in Valmiki's Ramayana in 2nd half of the 1st millennium B.C.E., however, the cult of his worshipping did not begin before 1000 C.E. After Moslim occupation of India, this cult was on the rise as a response to increasing self-awareness of Hindus. Vernacular Ramayanas that started appearing in India from 12th c. already express Hanuman's profound emotional attachment to Rama. This elevation of a simian - a creature placed in between animal and human realms - to a high spiritual status, is as a profoundly significant fact. The divine monkey thus arises as a servant of deity that preserves the order of the cosmos, but also as a self-assertive champion who inspires the less privileged.
...From 19th c. onwards, India saw acceleration of the Hanuman-cult propagation. (It is important to realize the meaning that Indians have traditionally ascribed to Word - words were seen as reified and eternal, and as such had the Power.) At the time Tulsidas, who is supposed to be the founding father of the worship, produced a retelling of the Rama-story in which Hanuman become the main hero and the narrative spotlight shifts from the more distant Rama to the more accessible monkey-hero.
...After surveying popular literature devoted to Hanuman, examining its genres and evolutionary trends, Lutgendorf proceeds to address the content of this literature. Chapters 4 and 5 represent an exciting attempt at constructing a Hanumayana, a divine biography of the monkey hero, and as such constitute the core of the book. The author presents to English-speaking readers a representative sample of the many stories about Hanuman that circulate in India, particularly those that were not included in the "canonical" Ramayana texts (e.g., Valmiki, Kamban, Tulsidas). He puts forth synopses of 40 representative tales that recur with only minor variations in multiple regional traditions or storytellers' repertoires.
...The very interesting last chapter revolves around the theme of `mediation'. The cult of Hanuman is seen as but one subspecies of the broader human preoccupation with simians that represent mediation, similarity, and difference. Lutgendorf interrogates here the wider human fascination with anthropoid primates as boundary beings, exemplifying the Other and thus permitting the articulation and demarcation of the Self. In the section about the famous Chinese monkey-king Sun Wukong the author looks for parallels between the Indian and Chinese literary and religious tradition, and subscribes to the theory of the Ramayana-influence on the 16th-century Chinese novel along the southern maritime route.
...As regards the style of this monograph, one could characterize it as `demanding but friendly' approach of an erudite author in a constant dialog with the reader. As an anonymous reviewer at Amazon.com pointed out, the author is "equipped with great humility and respect which is necessary for a Western scholar in order to probe into the core of Hanuman worship". As to Lutgendorf's linguistic competence, he relies mainly on his proficiency in Hindi and Sanskrit while duly pointing at areas that lie beyond his reach, quite in accord with the ancient Taoist saying: `To know what one does not know is the highest wisdom.' (After all, it is impossible for any scholar to cover linguistically the whole area of India with its many languages and regional dialects.) One little point to make in this respect is, however, the author's occasional `smuggling' of Hindi terms into the text that are not included in the Glossary, which makes it rather unintelligible for a reader not proficient in the language; also, it would be useful for a reader to have Hindi titles in Bibliography translated into English, not just transliterated.
...Finally, this comprehensive and well-researched work cannot be more warmly recommended not just as an excellent source of knowledge on Sri Hanuman to the students of Indian and South-East Asian religion and culture, but also to all inquisitive minds fascinated with the philosophical legacy of India.