PRADYUMNA EPZI C

This book provides the first fullscale Englishlanguage study of Pradyumna the son of the Hindu god Krsna. Often represented as a young man in midadolescence Pradyumna is both a handsome double of his demonslaying father and the rebirth of Kamadeva the God of Love. Sanskrit epic puranic and kavya narratives of the 3001300 CE period celebrate Pradyumnas sexual potency mastery of illusory subterfuges and military prowess in supporting the work of his avatara father. These materials reflect the values of an evolving Brahminical and Vaisnava tradition that was deeply invested in the imperatives of family patrilines the violent but necessary defense of the social and cosmic order and the celebration of beauty and desire as a means to the divine. Pradyumnas evolving narratives almost completely absent from existing studies of Hindu mythology provide a point of access to the development of Krsna bhakti and Vaisnava theism more broadly. Conversely Jain sources cast Pradyumna as an exemplary figure through whom a pointed rejection of these values can be articulated even while sharing certain of their elementary premises. Pradyumna Lover Magician and Scion of the Avatara assembles these narratives presents key Sanskrit materials in translation and summary form and articulates the social gender and religious values encoded in them. Most importantly the study argues that Pradyumnas signature twohanded maneuverthe audacious appropriation of a feminine partner enabled by the emasculating destruction of her demonic male protectorcommunicates a persistent fantasy of male power expressed in the language of a mutually implicating sex and violence.