Vikram and the Vampire is a number of stories within a story. It is an old Hindu folk tale that was translated by Sir Richard R. Burton from the original Sanskrit. He’s possibly more well known for his translations of The Arabian Nights and The Kama Sutra.

The story is about King Vikram who has promised a sorcerer that he will capture a baital, or vampire. The baital must be transported from his tree back to the sorcerer. They make a pact that the King must never answer a question posed by the baital. If he does, the vampire is returned to the tree from which he came and the journey must start over.

To fill in the time during their travels, the baital tells 11 different stories. These are similar in style to the fables written by Aesop. During the telling of the tales, he often outwits the king by forcing him to answer a question about the story. Vikram finally succeeds in delivering the baital to the sorcerer when the final tale ends in a question that can’t be answered. There's a final twist in that the vampire reveals the sorcerer’s intent to kill the king who then beheads the sorcerer first. He releases the vampire as a reward for his service.

The fables covered morality topics such as greed, lust and envy. Often a wrong or immoral decision leads to the downfall of the main character. What I found most interesting was the frequent inclusion of suicide in these stories. Women kill themselves when they can’t be with a man they’ve seen only once and a family of four beheads themselves for the honor of a god. I don’t know much about the Hindu culture but, from a Western viewpoint, this doesn’t speak well to their value of human life.

The writing also includes very detailed descriptions of female appearances. Every aspect of their body is related to some pleasing natural quality. For example, their teeth are often like strings of opals. The litany of similes goes on for paragraphs and they are very similar between the 11 individual tales. The first few instances were entertaining but they became tiresome half way through the book.

The book provided an interesting reading experience but I was ready for the end after the first few parables. They were all very similar and became repetitive. The original collection of folk tales in Vikram and the Vampire is actually composed of 25 stories but Burton only translated 11. Thank goodness. ( )

Dull. Windy and with little point. Certainly way to purple for any kind of charm.

Nominally this is supposed to be the basis for all the oriental fairy tales of the likes of Aladin and 1001 nights. I can't see it myself. A king listens to 12 tales from a vampire (why is inadequately explained, and doesn't seem to be the creature western culture associated with this name). He fails to note the moral principles being expounded (although they aren't very clear to the reader either - and it is unclear whether the vampire's explanations can be trusted) but eventually gain a reward of bountiful kingship.

Lot s and lots of names and characters of various princes and princesses, all of which blur into one another - not helped by the vampire's anecdotal interjections of yet more persons. Most of their actions also seem very opaque - although this is partly casued by my unfamiliarity with Indian culture and class - two themes that seem very important to the characters. There are a lots of 'honoruable' actions and debates about whether a person of such a class could or should do such a thing. Women (of course) aren't expected to be seen and not heard, and a slave to their master's will, committing suicide upon his death. Quite a lot of the charcters die one way or another, mostly for unclear reasons. A few get brought back to life by magic or religions - almost equally unclear.

The general layout translation and formatting is well done. There are plenty of footnoted references - which work in the epub - explaing some of the more obscure terms to the western reader. Not everything is explained but enough are for it to be clear - the coi-ness over avoiding the world hell, is noteworthy of the 1900s when this was translated from the ancient Hindi.

Kind of interesting ish for some of the insights into ancient Indian culture - but a bit more familiarity with the basic concepts might be necessary, given that they are so far from established western norms. ( )

Vikram and the Vampire is a number of stories within a story. It is an old Hindu folk tale that was translated by Sir Richard R. Burton from the original Sanskrit. He’s possibly more well known for his translations of The Arabian Nights and The Kama Sutra.

The story is about King Vikram who has promised a sorcerer that he will capture a baital, or vampire. The baital must be transported from his tree back to the sorcerer. They make a pact that the King must never answer a question posed by the baital. If he does, the vampire is returned to the tree from which he came and the journey must start over.

To fill in the time during their travels, the baital tells 11 different stories. These are similar in style to the fables written by Aesop. During the telling of the tales, he often outwits the king by forcing him to answer a question about the story. Vikram finally succeeds in delivering the baital to the sorcerer when the final tale ends in a question that can’t be answered. There's a final twist in that the vampire reveals the sorcerer’s intent to kill the king who then beheads the sorcerer first. He releases the vampire as a reward for his service.

The fables covered morality topics such as greed, lust and envy. Often a wrong or immoral decision leads to the downfall of the main character. What I found most interesting was the frequent inclusion of suicide in these stories. Women kill themselves when they can’t be with a man they’ve seen only once and a family of four beheads themselves for the honor of a god. I don’t know much about the Hindu culture but, from a Western viewpoint, this doesn’t speak well to their value of human life.

The writing also includes very detailed descriptions of female appearances. Every aspect of their body is related to some pleasing natural quality. For example, their teeth are often like strings of opals. The litany of similes goes on for paragraphs and they are very similar between the 11 individual tales. The first few instances were entertaining but they became tiresome half way through the book.

The book provided an interesting reading experience but I was ready for the end after the first few parables. They were all very similar and became repetitive. The original collection of folk tales in Vikram and the Vampire is actually composed of 25 stories but Burton only translated 11. Thank goodness. ( )

vampire folklore - India.

*note to self. Copy from A.(DIFFERENT COVER. SCAN WHEN READ)