Storybook Plan: Demon Brothers

The plan here continues from my project research post with a few additions or changes to the story ideas.

Two Themes:

• No one is born evil
• Fear of monsters creates monsters (aka evil is born in the minds of men)

Characters:

• Ilvala and Vatapi - can't leave these guys out of the story
• Agastya 
• Some rakshasas - possibly Kabandha and Vibhishana and others
• Some brahmins and some townsfolk

Story Style Ideas:

• Told as collection of stories that start with daring readers to learn the truth of the brothers whose end is so we'll known
• Told as journal entries of a journal found in the Badami Cave Temple
• Told as a story that is passed down through generations

Some Setting Info:

• A forest (probably Dandaka Forest)
• Badami (used to be called Vatapi)

Bhutanatha temple on the edge of Agastya lake in Badami - image source

Bibliography/Sources of Info:

• Ilvala wikipedia page
• Agastya Lake tourist info page
•  Brahmin wikipedia page
• Rakshasa wikipedia page
• Ramayana, Public Domain Edition by M. Dutt, R. Dutt, Gould, Griffith, Hodgson, Mackenzie, Nivedita, Oman, Richardson, and Ryder.

The Story Outlines:

1. First will be the story “A Promise Made” where the two brothers come home to a hut in the forest and find their parents gone. When the parents never return the brothers decide to leave the place and swear an oath to let nothing separate them from then on. They run into different rakshasas while traveling and different humans as well and they determine that the two are not that different from each other.

2. Next is the story “Respect Grown” where the brothers are attacked for being rakshasas but they refuse to attack back and end up saved by a brahmin. The brothers stay for awhile and gain a ton of respect for brahmins and decide to always help them if they are in need of it. (They may be granted a boon while staying with the brahmin). Before leaving they end up helping a lost human child (through Vatapi transforming). They decide they want to unite the worlds of human and rakshasa. Ilvala talks to rakshasas and Vatapi talks to humans while transformed.

3. Last is the story “Evil is Born” where after the brothers have worked hard to get a position of power to work on their goal they are refused the boon of a son who could continue their work. And then the brothers snap, end up killing many brahmins and then are eventually defeated by Agastya.

4. A bonus story “Hope is Found” is several years later. Agastya comes across a half-rakshasa half-human child and takes him in. Agastya teaches the child all he can so that this child could be the bridge between the humans and rakshasas.

Topic Research: The Demon Brothers

The demon brothers Ilvala and Vatapi tricked and killed many brahmins after one refused Ilvala the boon of a son. Vatapi has the power of transformation and Ilvala knows a special mantra that allows him to call Vatapi back from death. They both end up dying at the hand of the sage Agastya who sees through their tricks. The follow are possibly the three stories I'd tell for the project.

1. First, a story to show why the two brothers are staying together and ruling together. And because I couldn't find anything on their past but I was thinking I'd write a story telling the reader that they were close since they were young but they ended up abandoned by their parents (maybe they wake up and they are alone with no trace of their parents) and swear an oath to let nothing separate them.

2. The next story would be something to show that even tho they are demons they are not evil. At least not yet. This could start off with them getting attacked by regular humans because of what they are but then they are saved by a brahmin. Here they decide to always show respect to brahmins and help them if they are in need of it. After separating from the brahmins the brothers see a child crying due to being separated from his parents. The brothers decide to help but because they are demons Vatapi transforms into a friendly dog to lead the boy home. I'd like one of them to point out how unfair their life is being born demons at the end of this story.

3. In the last story I'd like the beginning to show that even though they are demons they have worked hard to live a life they are happy with when the two start thinking about wanting to pass on their experiences. Then a brahmin visit them at the palace and after a meal Ilvala asks for the boon of a son. But the brahmin refuses saying something like "Boons such as that are not granted to demons." And this is the turning point where everything just becomes too much and they snap killing the brahmin. And then they start killing all brahmins that come visiting until the sage who saved them in the earlier story come and they are defeated. This would be the retelling of the story found on the wikipedia page on Ilvala.

The conclusion of these stories would show that often evil is created from the treatment and expectations of men.

The picture below could be the "palace" they live in at the end of their life.

The home of Vatapi and Ilvala

(image source)

Topic Brainstorm

I basically have no previous knowledge on any of these topics except for a few references and what I have read for this class so far. The following are the topics that I am considering:


Epic brothers - I am interested in the topic of brothers because family has always been important to me and I also have a younger brother. For this topic it would be fun to tell a story of two brothers who always have each other's back and can always rely on each other. I could do this by taking two brothers and either retelling a story of an adventure or creating a new adventure for them to go on. What I would like to do with this topic is put the brothers in a situation where one ends up helping the other with something and then they get dragged into trouble in which they work together to get out of. Here are two links I found that look promising on the demon brothers who I would most likely end up writing about: Ilvala Wikipedia page and The Story of Ilvala and Vatapi from medium.com


Creation stories - This topic seems interesting because a big question about life is "Why are we here?" And to understand the end of something, it is good to look at the beginning. Every place has it's own creation stories and for this topic, since there are different creation stories and myths for Indian epics, I think it would be interesting to try and combine some of them into one story. I could tell them in such a way that some character is teaching someone else. And this is a link I found: Hindu creation myths Wikipedia page


Supernatural characters from Ramayana - I have always found supernatural creatures and stories interesting. For this it would be fun to create new origin story for a character or take a character that is seen as bad and make him/her or at least more "grey" and relatable. These are a couple links I found: Ashura vs Rakshasa video and Rakshasa Wikipedia page

Supernatural Beings of Indian Epics

(image source)

The Chiranjivi immortals - This topic also goes along with the supernatural which I have always found interesting. For this I would most likely tell a story of one of the immortals from their birth to gaining immortality and then what they might be doing in the modern world today.  Here are two links: Chiranjivi Wikipedia page and The 8 Immortals video