O Mother!: Godmothers of God's Own Country - Couverture souple

Madapat, Saji; Rider, Tiger; Mavericks, EPM; Murugan, Puli

Couverture souple

ISBN 10 : 1958260843 ISBN 13 : 9781958260845

Editeur : Tiger Rider, 2026

Synopsis

In the courtyard of the grove, as the drums roll and the crowned goddess whirls in trance, one cry fills the air: Amme!—O Mother! It is a cry of fear, a plea for protection, and an expression of love—the cry of a land where God takes a woman’s form. This book belongs to the goddesses who answer it.
This volume of The Gods of The God’s Own Country gathers the origin stories of more than seventy-five mother goddesses, drawn from the hundreds worshipped by the many communities of North Malabar. Village goddesses who reign over and guard their villages. Bhadrakali, born from Shiva’s third eye to end the demon Darika, and the Chamundis, Shakti incarnate. Kurathi and Kothamoori, keepers of the harvest. Vasoorimala and the goddesses who sow smallpox and take it away, approached in fear and in faith. Voyagers who came across the sea in wooden ships.
And some were women first. Kadangot Makkam, whose adoring brothers, turned against her by a lie, killed her with her children. Muchilottu Bhagavathy, the learned young woman condemned for answering a question truthfully, who walked into fire to prove her innocence. Vannathi Pothi, the washerwoman who refused a goddess and became one. Their stories ask an unsettling question: what does it mean to worship a goddess while denying dignity to living women? Even in the legends of the male gods, women become divine, as Chemmarathi does beside Kathivanoor Veeran.
Tracing the Mother from the Indus Valley to Greece and Egypt, the book explores how she took root in Kerala’s Dravidian soil: in Shakti worship, in the blood-red guruthi of the goddess groves, in the family deities of ancestral houses, and in the Bhagavathy’s glory spreading from the great grove of Madayi Kavu to village shrines. It reads the ritual in which the goddess descends in towering headdress, painted face, silver fangs, and ornamented waist. And in a tradition where men embody every god and goddess, it unveils the one exception: Devakuth, danced by a woman on the island of Thekkumbad. Each goddess comes with her costume, her rite, and the groves where she is still performed, alongside striking photographs taken in those groves. A glossary guides readers new to the tradition.
Saji Madapat, honored with the Kala Sreshta award for his contributions to Theyyam, has witnessed and documented more than two hundred Theyyam forms across more than fifty sacred groves, and this book distills years of that fieldwork. With a foreword by Fulbright scholar Prof. David V. Mason and a preface by Kerala folklorist Chandran Muttath.
In these goddesses, fury and mercy wear one face, and still they watch over the generations. For the student of Indian mythology, the spiritual seeker, and every reader who loves a great story: welcome to the Mother’s grove. Many names. One cry.
The second of two companion volumes that together tell the origin stories of some 150 Theyyams. The hero-gods await in O Lord! Godfathers of God’s Own Country.

Détails de l'édition

• Éditeur: Tiger Rider
• Date d'édition: 2026
• Langue: anglais
• ISBN 10: 1958260843
• ISBN 13: 9781958260845
• Reliure: Broché
• Nombre de pages: 189
• Éditeur: Mason Dr. David, Muttath Chandran
• Coordonnées du fabricant: Printed by Amazon on behalf of the author; https://www.amazon.fr/hz/contact-us; ; c/o Amazon Media EU S.à.r.l., 38 Avenue John F. Kennedy; Luxembourg; L-1855; Luxembourg