Pastoralist traditions have long been extraordinarily important to the social, economic, political, and cultural life of the
region of western India called Maharashtra. The Marathi-language oral literature of the Dhangar shepherds of
Maharashtra is not only one of the most important elements of their own traditional cultural life, but also a treasure of
world literature. This volume presents two lively and well-crafted examples of the ovi, a genre typical of the oral literature of Dhangars. The two ovis in the volume narrate the stories of Biroba and Dhuloba, two of the most important gods of Dhangar shepherds. Each of the ovis tells an elaborate story of the birth of the god--a miraculous and complicated process in both cases--and of the struggles each one goes through in order to find and win his bride. The extensive introduction provides a literary analysis of the ovis and discusses what they reveal about the cosmology, geography, society, administrative structures, and economy of their performers' world, and about the performers views of pastoralistsand women.

The oldest extant Marathi work, a medieval chronicle of Chakradhar’s divine life on earth, in a new English translation. God at Play, or Līḷācaritra, is a remarkable biography of the medieval religious figure Chakradhar Svami. His followers, called Mahanubhavs, understand him to be a divine incarnation of Parameshvar. Mhaimbhat, a Brahmin goldsmith who became one of Chakradhar’s most important followers, compiled this astonishingly down-to-earth religious text around 1278. It records not only Chakradhar’s ethical and theological teachings, but also his everyday activities, including the foods he ate and the people he met. This rich, detailed account provides insights into economic conditions, political history, and society in medieval India. Manuscripts of the work were carefully preserved within the Mahanubhav community and were not known to outsiders until the early twentieth century. The first volume of God at Play describes Chakradhar’s early life, his wanderings as a lone ascetic, and the gathering of the disciples who later accompany him on his travels. This new English translation of Līḷācaritra is accompanied by an emended Marathi text, based on Hari Narayan Nene’s edition, in the Devanagari script.