Includes characters who are obsessed with the rise and fall of gods, empires and heroes.

For the centennial of his birth, R. K. Narayan's most celebrated novel
Formerly India's most corrupt tourist guide, Raju just released from prison seeks refuge in an abandoned temple. Mistaken for a holy man, he plays the part and succeeds so well that God himself intervenes to put Raju's newfound sanctity to the test. Narayan's most celebrated novel, The Guide won him the National Prize of the Indian Literary Academy, his country's highest literary honor.
For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking...

The greatest Indian epic, one of the world's supreme masterpieces of storytelling
A sweeping tale of abduction, battle, and courtship played out in a universe of deities and demons, The Ramayana is familiar to virtually every Indian. Although the Sanskrit original was composed by Valmiki around the fourth century BC, poets have produced countless versions in different languages. Here, drawing on the work of an eleventh-century poet called Kamban, Narayan employs the skills of a master novelist to re-create the excitement he found in the original. A luminous saga made...