Stories From Mahabharata

The Mahabharata (composed between 300 BC and 300 AD) has the honor of being the longest epic in world literature, 100,000 2-line stanzas (although the most recent critical edition edits this down to about 88,000), making it eight times as long as Homer's Iliad and Odyssey together, and over 3 times as long as the Bible (Chaitanya VII). According to the Varasimhan version, only about 4000 lines relate to the main story; the rest contain additional myths and teachings. In other words, the 'Mahabharata' resembles "long journey with many side roads and detours." It is said that "whatever is here is found elsewhere. But whatever is not here is nowhere else".

The name means 'great (story of the) Bharata'. Bharata was an early ancestor of both the Pandavas and Kauravas who fight each other in a great war, but the word is also used generically for the Indian race, so the Mahabharata sometimes is referred to as 'the great story of India'.