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KaseyHennessee

Blank pages

Reviewed in the United States on May 8, 2019

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It says Illustrated but there is only one image of Brahma at the beginning and then many blank pages throuought the book that was clearly meant for pictures so I don’t know what happened there but besides that it’s pretty good.

kanukurthy sudershanrao

The description of the book

Reviewed in the United States on August 14, 2018

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The description of the book states illustrated but it carries a few drawings, the original sanskrit text is not provided any where in the book because of which one will be reading through the eyes of the author which is a disappointment.

Wizardwanderer

Very few illustrations. 19th century book reprint.

Reviewed in the United States on September 25, 2020

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This text serves my purposes as a novice seeking to have a large collection of the Rig Veda hymns in English translaton. The 19th century translations are not too bad but the proof reading of the OCR scan leaves something to be desired. Errors that should have been caught by a good copy editor. But the real surprise was that there are only a handful of illustrations. Well, on the other hand the margins are very wide, so you can draw your own illustrations. Too bad more care in formatting was not taken.

Robert C. Wheeler

The Rig Veda in old translation

Reviewed in the United States on October 10, 2012

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This is an old translation of the Rig Veda made by Ralph Griffith in 1890. Unfortunately it is the only complete translation available in English. There is another contemporary translation by Brereton et al. from Oxford Press, however; it is out of print. Penguin has a translation by Wendy Doniger of 108 of the hymns (about 10% of the total) which is very good because she has many notes and explanatory material.

This translation has many flaws which are noted by other reviewers.

Forfex Sceleris

Text-only, connoisseur-only

Reviewed in the United States on July 19, 2012

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This is just a reprint of Griffith's translation. No introduction, prologue, notes or explanation. This means that unless you have medium or advanced knowledge of the Vedic religion, this edition will probably be too obscure (more often than not, gods and characters are referred to by complex epithets in Sanskrit). I would strongly recommend against buying this book for beginners.

That said, if you have a fair grasp on the Vedic religion (as either a student, practitioner or amateur researcher) and are looking for an affordable full version of the Rigveda, this may be for you (also, if you care only for the text itself, not much about catching the entire meaning).

I say "may", because even though the book is cheap enough, it falls quite short on design: it's simply (and says so in the book) sort of the Griffith translation taken from a Word document printed and bound for market publishing. This means there are typos, the special characters for transliteration (such as dotted consonants) are in a bigger font size than the rest of the text, and, noteworthy, some hymn titles are at the end of the page, with the hymn beginning in the next page.

I'd like to say you get your money's worth, but at $13.93 maybe you could simply go to the source (Forgotten Books' website) and print this yourself. If you own a tablet or Kindle, you should try Wilson's edition (digitized by Google), which is commented almost all the way. If you're more of a book-in-the-hand kind of person, and a beginner in (or just curious about) the Vedic tradition, you'll be better off with Penguin's edition or any other more serious abridged version.

In short, the only strong points of this edition are the translation and the fact that it's the full Rigveda.

Kristie

Five Stars

Reviewed in the United States on March 9, 2018

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Its a good translation. I love older books great read.

Karthikeyan

Would have been great if index would have been given

Reviewed in the United States on January 18, 2014

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you also can get the book for free if you download from the publisher website. Great read. Simple translation. Comprehensive.

gary may

Five Stars

Reviewed in the United States on August 14, 2016

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great reading

Top reviews from other countries

PHILIP HEWITT

3 illustrations does not make an illustrated edition

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on December 24, 2020

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This was a huge disappointment. It says it is illustrated but there are literally only three illustrations, which are black and white engravings in the opening pages, before the text content even starts. Three illustrations in a 480 page book surely cannot qualify this as an 'illustrated edition' as it is described.

Amazon Customer

Good to have available thanks!

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on November 14, 2017

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Thank you for this ...for my Dad.

Elsie

Five Stars

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on November 24, 2015

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Good book but takes some reading its mainly a reference book or read it slowly

Krishan Chand Has been a great absorbing read. Author's lament and praise of lord is a long long son

Pathetic

Reviewed in India on October 6, 2019

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Seriously such old english. Some fool had an ambition to imitate Shakespeare while translating a Hindu scripture. Result is this BORING never ending excercise in futility. Don't waste time or money.

Lee M

Five Stars

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on December 10, 2016

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Ty

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