Ancient
Beatitude
Bhishma
Category=FBC
Category=QRDF
Commentary
Couplets
Culture
Devotion
Dharma
Duty
Epic
eq_bestseller
eq_classics
eq_fiction
eq_isMigrated=1
eq_isMigrated=2
eq_nobargain
Ethics
forthcoming
Grief
Hinduism
History
Indian
Intellectual
Karma
Knowledge
Literature
Meditation
Moksha
Narayana
Notes
Peace
Philosophy
Poem
Poetry
Rebirth
Sanskrit
Scholarship
Shanti Parvan
Spirituality
Teachings
Tradition
Translation
Vedanta
Vishnu
War
Wisdom
Yudhishthira
Product details
- ISBN 9780226835921
- Weight: 454g
- Dimensions: 152 x 229mm
- Publication Date: 05 Aug 2026
- Publisher: The University of Chicago Press
- Publication City/Country: US
- Product Form: Hardback
Secure
checkout
Fast Shipping
Easy returns
A translation of the twelfth book of The Mahābhārata, an epic tale of history and kingship, reinforced with legends, romances, and metaphysical, theological, and ethical teachings written in Sanskrit 1700 or more years ago.
A remarkable composition of 100,000 couplets, The Mahābhārata is the second-longest poem in world literature. In this volume, James L. Fitzgerald completes his translation of the twelfth of The Mahābhārata’s eighteen books, the vast Shanti Parvan, or The Book of Peace. Covering a wide range of ancient Indian intellectual history, The Book of Peace was intended to serve as a comprehensive, brahmin-inspired basis for living a Good Life in a Good Society in a Good Polity and is one of the most important and complex books of the poem.
Fitzgerald’s previous contribution to the Chicago edition of The Mahābhārata, volume 7, opened with Book 11, The Book of the Women, which movingly portrayed the grief of the wives, mothers, and sisters of the many warriors slain in the epic’s central war narrative. The crises of grief presented in The Book of the Women give particular poignancy and depth to the shanti, or pacification, that is the theme of Book 12, The Book of Peace. Volume 7 included the first half of The Book of Peace, and volume 8 now completes it with the second half, which is focused particularly on the ways people can escape the cycle of rebirth and realize sublime beatitude by way of saving knowledge or yoga meditation or devotion to God Viṣṇu-Nārāyaṇa. Supported by an extensive introduction and notes, this publication will be greeted as a major event in Sanskrit studies.
A remarkable composition of 100,000 couplets, The Mahābhārata is the second-longest poem in world literature. In this volume, James L. Fitzgerald completes his translation of the twelfth of The Mahābhārata’s eighteen books, the vast Shanti Parvan, or The Book of Peace. Covering a wide range of ancient Indian intellectual history, The Book of Peace was intended to serve as a comprehensive, brahmin-inspired basis for living a Good Life in a Good Society in a Good Polity and is one of the most important and complex books of the poem.
Fitzgerald’s previous contribution to the Chicago edition of The Mahābhārata, volume 7, opened with Book 11, The Book of the Women, which movingly portrayed the grief of the wives, mothers, and sisters of the many warriors slain in the epic’s central war narrative. The crises of grief presented in The Book of the Women give particular poignancy and depth to the shanti, or pacification, that is the theme of Book 12, The Book of Peace. Volume 7 included the first half of The Book of Peace, and volume 8 now completes it with the second half, which is focused particularly on the ways people can escape the cycle of rebirth and realize sublime beatitude by way of saving knowledge or yoga meditation or devotion to God Viṣṇu-Nārāyaṇa. Supported by an extensive introduction and notes, this publication will be greeted as a major event in Sanskrit studies.
James L. Fitzgerald is St. Purandara Das Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Sanskrit, Department of Classics, Brown University.
