"CURSE OF KEHAMA" STORY Stories, Folktales, Folklore, Fairy Tales, Myths, Legends, Fables, Nursery Rhymes, Bible, Classics, General Information STORY LOVERS WORLD SOS: SEARCHING OUT STORIES The Story Lovers World home page is at: http://www.story-lovers.com To add to the lists below, please e-mail jackie@storyloversworld.com

	CURSE OF KEHAMA Scroll down or click on your choice below • Online links to info about "The Curse of Kehama" • SOS - Searching Out Stories about "The Curse of Kehama" ~~Advice, References from Storytellers, Teachers, Librarians

ONLINE LINKS TO INFORMATION ABOUT "THE CURSE OF KEHAMA"

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• http://www.wwnorton.com/college/english/nael/romantic/topic_4/southey.htm
The Romantic Period: Topics: Romantic Orientalism: Text and Contexts. Robert Southey from "The Curse of Kehama"

• http://tinyurl.com/o5jlhe
The original "The Curse of Kehama" by Robert Southey, published 1811.

• http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/the-curse-of-kehama/
"The Curse of Kehama" poem by Robert Southey (1774-1843) from PoemHunter.com

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SOS - SEARCHING OUT STORIES AND INFORMATION ABOUT "THE CURSE OF KEHAMA"
Advice, Discussion and References from Storytellers, Teachers and Librarians
(excerpts from Storytell posts plus original research)

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1) Robert Southey wrote a poem in 1810 with this title. A search of the Internet turns up all sorts of information about the poem except *what the story i.". We sons of learning ("student" in Irish is literally "son of learning" - mac leinn) in Dublin are temporarily orphaned. The National Library, one of my homes away from home, is temporarily closed, so I can't ramble through the dusty tome presumably somewhere in its depths. Does anyone know the story? It's something about a man who can't die.

2) Not the complete story, but - from the Oxford Companion to English Literature:
"The story of Kehama, the cruel raja of the world, and the peasant Ladurlad, who is cursed for his endeavour to protect his daughter Kailyal from the lust of Arvalan, Kehama's son. After many vicissitudes, based on complex Hindu mythology, Kehama finds himself under the dominion of the lord of Hell, while Ladurlad and Kailyal are transported to heaven." I can't find any of the names in my Indian sources, some sound in fact more Iranian.

3) It may be pouring tar on murky waters, but here is the reference I have. Samuel Lover introduces the story "The Curse of Kishogue" in his 1831 Legends & Stories of Ireland (Nonsuch Classics) (Vol. 1), thus, referring to Southey's poem: "There has been already known to the literary world a celebrated curse, called "The Curse of Kehama"... points of difference ... and yet one point of coincidence between them -- the drinking of a cup. Now as regards the variety, Kehama's curse was that he could not die; while poor Kishogue's was that he did ... Kehama in not having the cup to drink, and Kishogue in having it to drink and refusing it ..." Kishogue's curse was a curse he put on others, not a curse resulting in his own death, as Lover implies in his strained comparison. Kehama's curse was put on Kehama by someone else, according to Lover, but by or through Kehama on Ladurlad according to Doriss's reading through microfiche mist of Southey's poem. Part of the confusion is due to the ambivalence of the Anguish languish here: Midas' Curse is a curse on Midas, while a widow's curse is a curse put on someone by a widow.

4) A complete version of The Curse Of Kehama is available here through amazon.com.

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Created 2003; last update 5/26/09