Kashi
DEAD IN BANARAS
Death in Banaras
This book is primaryly about the priests and other kinds of 'sacred specialist' who serve them:about the way in which they organise their business,and about their representations of death and understanding of the rituals over which they preside.all three levels are informed by a common ideoligical preoccupation with controlling chaos and contingency.the anthro pologist who writes about death inevitably writes about the world of the living,and Dr Parry is centrally concerned with concepts of the body and the person in contemporary hinduism,with ideas about hierarchy,renunciation and sacrifice,and with the relationship between hierarchy and notions of complementarity and holism.
Holy Kashi to Vibrant Varanasi
Kashi/Banaras/Varanasi is a world of its own, a veritable mini India, unique in almost all respects. Its contradictions can be seen in its blend of spirituality and darkness, sanctity and filth, purity and deceipt, culture and grossness.
Luminous Kashi to Vibrant Varanasi presents, as no other book has done before, all these aspects of this paradoxical and fascinating city, and gives an amazing quantity of information on the city, its history, culture and people; its temples and tirthas, mathas and institutions; its scholars, some of them the best in the country; its festivals and lilas; its literature, music, painting and culture; its silk trade and crafts; and its typical inhabitants: sadhus, pandits, pandas, babus, rais, thugs and gundas. More than all, the book finds out, with the help of mythology and metaphysics, the essence of Kashi-its luminosity and its vibrancy! It finally says: walk not in the dark alleys, plunge not in the shallows, but more into the luminosity, and dive deep into the oceans of knowledge. The Kashi you find depends on how far you walk, how deep you dive!
Living, dying and transformation in Banaras : The crossing project
Sakta Contribution to Varanasi
This book incorporates a good number of paperrs on multiple aspects of Sakta traditions practised in Varanasi continuing from hoary past to-date. Beside philosophical, religious and cultural leanings the contents expose the iconographic, ritualistic and artistic rendering of the Divine Mother. Kasi or Varanasi has been a stronghold of religious and spiritual fervour, and several religious sects have contributed to its present texture. Saktism has also been a forceful current in the cultural stream of this holy city. This is evidenced by several Devi temples, Sakti-pithas, yantras, fairs and festivals associated with the worship of Mother-Goddess.
Sarnath, Varanasi and Kausambi A Pilgrim’s Guide Book
Textiles of Banaras
Vaisnava Contribution to Varanasi
Varanasi Vista Early Views of the Holy City
Wonderland Banaras
Banaras is the wonderland of the first sight. Banaras is the historical city of temples, trade and traditions. This is the sacred city of Siva and salvation with historical exigencies having moral, migrational and material significance. It is also the land of the great Ganga ghats whose first encounter excites a sense of admiration or wonder for their delicate beauty and fascinating charm.