SynopsisWhy should we be good? How should we be good? And how might we more deeply understand the moral and ethical failings--splashed across today's headlines--that have not only destroyed individual lives but caused widespread calamity as well, bringing communities, nations, and indeed the global economy to the brink of collapse? In The Difficulty of Being Good, Gurcharan Das seeks answers to these questions in an unlikely source: the 2,000 year-old Sanskrit epic, Mahabharata. A sprawling, witty, ironic, and delightful poem, the Mahabharata is obsessed with the elusive notion of dharma--in essence, doing the right thing. When a hero does something wrong in a Greek epic, he wastes little time on self-reflection; when a hero falters in the Mahabharata, the action stops and everyone weighs in with a different and often contradictory take on dharma. Each major character in the epic embodies a significant moral failing or virtue, and their struggles mirror with uncanny precision our own familiar emotions of anxiety, courage, despair, remorse, envy, compassion, vengefulness, and duty. Das explores the Mahabharata from many perspectives and compares the successes and failures of the poem's characters to those of contemporary individuals, many of them highly visible players in the world of economics, business, and politics. In every case, he finds striking parallels that carry lessons for everyone faced with ethical and moral dilemmas in today's complex world.Written with the flair and seemingly effortless erudition that have made Gurcharan Das a bestselling author around the world--and enlivened by Das's forthright discussion of his own personal search for a more meaningful life--The Difficulty of Being Good shines the light of an ancient poem on the most challenging moral ambiguities of modern life.
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Binding: PaperBack
About the author
Gurcharan Das is an author, commentator and thought leader. His latest book, India Grows at Night: A Liberal Case for a Strong State, was on the Financial Times?s best books for 2013. His much-acclaimed The Difficulty of Being Good is ?a riveting examination of governance and corruption in the modern world,? said Newsweek. His international bestseller, India Unbound, ?is a quiet earthquake? according to the Guardian, and available in seventeen languages and filmed by BBC.
Gurcharan Das studied philosophy at Harvard University and later attended Harvard Business School (AMP) where he is featured in three case studies. After heading Procter & Gamble India and South East Asia, he became managing director, Procter & Gamble Worldwide (Strategic Planning). At fifty, he took early retirement to become a full-time writer. He writes a regular column for five Indian newspapers, including the Times of India, and contributes to the Financial Times, the Wall Street Journal, Foreign Affairs and the New York Times. He has served on the juries of the Templeton Prize, the Milton Friedman Prize and the McKinsey Award.
His other literary works include a novel, A Fine Family, a book of essays, The Elephant Paradigm, and an anthology, Three Plays, consisting of Larins Sahib, a prize-winning play about the British in India, which has been presented at the Edinburgh Festival; Mira, which was produced off-Broadway to critical acclaim from New York critics; and 9 Jakhoo Hill which has been performed in major Indian cities. He is presently editing for Penguin Random House The Story of Indian Business in fifteen volumes, of which seven have already appeared. He lives in New Delhi with his wife.
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