For its dramatic sweep, vast array of characters and range of conflicts that cover love and war, bloodlust and retribution, magical realism and complex human emotion, The Mahabharata tops my list of the greatest of Indian fictions. There are innumerable versions of the epic but by far the most accessible is the abridged English prose translation by the statesman-scholar C Rajagoplachari. It was first published in 1958 and long ago crossed sales of a million copies.Read about another entry on the list.
--Marshal Zeringue