As a boy, the rich man ventured off to the city and worked his way to riches. He always promised to come back to his village and give back to his community. The village he came from was small and impoverished. Along his travels, he planned and built many establishments to help the village. Soon he decided to return for one major project that would be truly beneficial for the small town of Sisodra.
He decided to build a large factory on the outskirts of the village in order to create job opportunities. The factory would be a state-of-the-art facility, like none that had ever been built before. The main product manufactured there would be textiles in order to create an equal opportunity of employment for both males and females. The factory would be complete in one year and in the meantime the man decided to live in the village for the time being as the factory began development.
The man had no sense self-entitlement. He came from nothing, and sympathy and empathy were both traits he could best be described as having. He also came from nothing, so he never felt as if he was better than anyone. He was one of the richest and most respected men in the land and yet decided to live in the small home he grew up in. Day in and day out people would come to him for help, and his generosity never wavered. He built introduced proper plumbing, more reliable electricity and many other facilities to make the lives of the villagers much easier. Many women would walk miles on end everyday to reach the nearest source of clean. He built a small water treatment plant in order to assuage this problem. Along with these many projects he also spent his days overseeing the factory and nights helping the people of his village.
There also was a young man, about ten years younger than the rich man. He too, came from the same orphanage and was raised by the village. As he grew older, he decided not to venture out, as the rich man had done, and instead came seeking help directly from him but was turned away. He was seeking a monetary investment in his business. He wanted to build a large shopping center near the town and have various vendors rent out the open units. However, the generous man saw no beneficial qualities to the village and saw that it would solely take advantage of the village's resources. He also felt that this would drive the villagers off the path that was so characteristic of Sisodra. Sisodra was a a special place because almost all the businesses there helped the community in some way. The young man would not hear the generous man's explanation and began to despise him. His spite manifested in him a drive to become successful in any way possible.
Both the young man, and rich man came from very similar backgrounds and yet the young man felt less love, and support from his village. He felt as if winning the hearts of his village would lead to his happiness and the main object in his path was the rich man,
The young man left his village and did whatever it took to become as rich as the generous man. He took advantage of many people, and conned people through lying about his intentions. His motivation was his hatred for the generous man, and he dreamed one day of shaming him.
Years passed, and soon the young man came back to his home village to exact his revenge. By this time, the generous man's textile factory was doing quite well, and it provided a significant amount of job opportunities to inhabitants of the village.
The young man's plan was to build a factory. A factory very similar to the generous man's, however with more state-of-the-art technologies. It would be located right next to the generous man's factory. The young man hoped to take all of his employees and run the factory to the ground.
However, the building process was slow and encountered many delays. The young man grew impatient and put his entire savings into speeding up the process. His drive to spite the generous man over being rejected was quite ridiculous but the young man was blinded by rage and hatred.
Soon his factory would be opening and he began recruiting villagers to work in his factory. He talked to many families that were given jobs by the generous man and offered them lavish benefits. However, they could see through the young man's intentions and their loyalty and that of many other families still lay with the generous man for he had done so much for them already. This left the young man with no workers and an empty factory. The young man's plan to bring the generous man's amazing factory to the ground backfired and he was left bankrupt with no money. His factory remains vacant and never saw a plume of smoke exit its chimney.
Author's Note: This story is based off of Duryodhana's plan to make an extravagant camp next to the Pandavas to shame them. Duryodhana's plan, however, backfires when he ends up being saved by the Pandavas which is quite embarrassing for him. In my retelling of this story the generous man is the Pandavas, and the young man is Duryodhana. Similar to Narayan's story, the young man (Duryodhana) builds a factory (his camp) next to the already existing one (the Pandavas camp) in order to ruin the generous man (the Pandavas). However the plan backfires, just like in the epic. I decided to exclude a part where the generous man would save the young man's factory (similar to how the Pandavas save Duryodhana) because when I read the epic I really wished they had not saved them since he was such an evil person. Since this was my version of the story I got to let the young man receive what he rightfully deserved. This was a major reason why I chose this story. In order for me to be able to control the ending in the way that I thought was best fit. I think the Pandavas are much nicer than I would ever be and my track of thinking would be to simply let Duryodhana or in this case, the young man, learn his lesson.
Bibliography :
Narayan, R. K. (1978). The Mahabharata
Hello Avi! I hope you have had a great week so far! I enjoyed your storytelling post this week. You are such a creative writer! I liked how you added your own twist to the original story and made the Pandavas the generous man. I think your version was actually better than the other! Keep up the good work and I look forward to reading more of your posts in the future.
ReplyDeleteHi! So I think this was a really interesting spin you took on your storytelling this week. I definitely saw a lot of similarities between the two, but overall it was a completely different story. What I’m saying is that you did a great job creating a story all your own while still making it clear where it’s origins lay.
ReplyDeleteHey Avi, I really enjoyed reading your story! I wasn't sure what it was about since it had no title but I think that’s the best part because it made me want to read just to find out what is was all about! I think your concept to describe this scene from the epic was unique and fun. I personally think your version was a lot more fun to read and understand. Good job!
ReplyDeleteHe good morning Avi! I really like your rendition of the Pandavas and Duryodhana's plan to shame them. I'm glad you decided to write about it. The modern twist you added to the story turned out well. It really helps put the lesson the old story tries to teach into a more understandable sense of today. You did a great job making sure the reader understands that vengeance is a dangerous game to play. Keep up the awesome stories! I can't wait to read the next one!
ReplyDeleteI really liked the story you chose to base your storytelling off of this week .I found this part particularly interesting as I read the readings. The way you depicted Duryodhana’s embarrassment when the Pandavas did not save him after his plan backfires was great. The artwork you have chosen here is okay. I like how it is a real photo, which allows the reader to better imagine you descriptions. I do not like how your story is just one paragraph. I have noticed that you do that often in your storytelling posts and I think it would be really beneficial in showing a transitions if you would separate your paragraphs or indent them.
ReplyDeleteThis storytelling is really well-written. I'm coming to realize that you are a truly gifted writer. I like that you chose this story though you did stray from it quite a bit. There are certainly similarities, but I feel like your version could really be expanded to be its own stand-alone story. I do like that you really brought home the moral that vengeance is rarely a good path to choose.
ReplyDeleteHi Avi! I really liked reading your story about the generous man and the young man. It was a really interesting read and you had a very good idea of what you were trying to say with the story. I thought it was really creative of you retell the story of building a camp next to the Pandav’s in a whole new concept, that really does take some skill. While I was reading the story I was wondering what part of the class or readings you were referring to and was confused to why you were telling a random story, but then I read your author’s note at the bottom and it all made sense. As I was reading it was kind of hard to read and follow along because of grammar errors so you probably want to go back and fix that. Other than that I think you did a good job on separating your story into paragraphs so it is not one huge bulky read where I would get bored and lose interest. Overall you did a great job on the story, and I really liked how you were able to spin a whole new story from the camp building story.
ReplyDeleteHi Avi! I chose to read your portfolio for my extra credit free choice! I think you are a very good writer! I really enjoyed reading this. I was really drawn into your story and you kept me interested the whole time. I think part of what made it so intriguing was trying to find out who the rich man was supposed to be, and then who the young man was supposed to be. Near the end of the story, I had it figured out but I was definitely not sure at the beginning. I think it was cool how you made this story your own by not retelling the original story, but telling a new story that paralleled the original story. The young man, just like Duryodhana, was driven by all the wrong things. Instead of being driven by his love for his people, he was driven by hate for the rich man. I really like how you pointed that out. I thought it was really interesting how the rich man who came from nothing was able to stay humble despite all of the power he had gained. I think you did a really great job of telling this story in a more modern way, but still paralleling the story of how Duryodhana tried to move his camp next to the Pandavas. Overall, I loved it! Keep up the great work!
ReplyDeleteHey Avi! I think you did a good job retelling this story and modernizing it in a way. You stuck to the original tale in many ways but I appreciated how you decided to end your version. This mans' greed was his motivation and such drive is what caused his ultimate downfall. Why should a man like this in turn be saved. I was a little confused by the story at first but your Authors' note did a good job of clearing everything up and explaining your character choices. I did catch a large amount of grammatical errors that you may want to go back and fix. They are pretty obvious when you read through the story and if you cleared those up it would really improve your flow. Other than that you did a great job retelling this tale.
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