AN ALTERNATIVE MYTHOLOGY

Filmmaker and bestselling author Trisha Das’s novels present a comical, feminist take on the Mahabharata

- Neha Kirpal

Filmmaker and bestselling author Trisha Das has just released her latest book of feminist mythological fiction, Misters Kuru: A Return to Mahabharata (Harper Collins India, 2021).

A sequel of her book Ms Draupadi Kuru: After the Pandavas (HarperCollins, 2016), the racy, sassy roller-coaster ride, full of action, adventure, romance and comedy, is written as a kind of continuation of the Mahabharata set in the modern-day Kalyug in Delhi.

Previously, Trisha has also written and directed over 40 documentaries in her filmmaking career, and won an Indian National Film Award (2005) as well as was UGA’s ‘International Artist of the Year’ (2003).

She talks to us about the importance of reimagining and rewriting mythology from a female perspective, her earliest influences of Indian mythology, and incorporating comedy in a mythological context.

How were you motivated to write a feminist retelling of the Mahabharata in a contemporary setting?

The Kuru novels aren’t so much a retelling of the Mahabharata as they are a sequel of sorts. The story of