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The tradition of celebrating Rama's divinity and heroism that we
see in Valmiki's Ramayana is carried on in mystical
bhakti poetry of India (see pages 2373–2405 in volume B).
- Like Aeneas in Virgil's Aeneid, Rama
is an epic hero defined by his virtuous nature and his ability
to remain dedicated to his goal of creating a better society
for his people (pages 1055–1056
in volume B).
- Ramayana's
Sita bears
much in common with the Odyssey's Penelope.
Both women are portrayed as strong, yet loyal wives who
endure separation from their husbands and resist the sexual
advances made by suitors and captors (pages
237–239 in volume A).
- The Mahabharata,
like the Iliad, is a narrative based on historical
memories of events; for Hindus, the real importance of the
Mahabharata
is that it functions as an ancestral narrative (pages
120–122 in volume A).
- The Buddhist tale collection the Jataka
influenced several well-known tale collections, including
The Thousand and One Nights (volume B, pages 1566–1618),
The Decameron (volume B, pages 1963–1991),
and The Canterbury Tales (volume
B, pages 2045–2119).
- The form of the Buddhist Jataka
tales, wherein each tale opens with a narrator reciting
an epigrammatic verse that arouses the listener's curiosity
by summarizing the moral of the story and the subject matter,
was later replicated in the Pańcatantra (see
pages 1258–1267 in volume B).
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The emphasis on devotion in the Bhagavad-Gita is a strong
undercurrent in bhatki poetry, the mystical poetry of India
focusing on the love between beings and deities (see pages 2373–2405 in
volume B).
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