Duryodhana

In the Mahabharata, the later of the
two great Hindu epics, Duryodhana is
the eldest son of King Dhrtarashtra,
and thus the leader of the Kauravas,
one of the two royal factions whose
struggle for power is at the heart of the
epic. Duryodhana and ninety-nine
brothers are born in an unusual manner. Their mother Gandhari gives birth
to a great lump of flesh, which is divided and put into one hundred pots of
clarified butter. In these pots the lumps
develop into infants. At the moment
Duryodhana is born there are a host of
evil omens, and when the court
astrologers are asked to interpret these,
they conclude that Duryodhana will be
the ruin of the country and his family,
and that it will be better to abandon
him to the elements. Fatherly feelings
prevent Dhrtarashtra from doing this,
which sets the stage for the final conflict. Even though the major force driving the epic’s plot is the animosity
between Duryodhana and his cousins,
the Pandavas, and this ends with the
Kauravas being utterly destroyed,
it would be inaccurate to paint
Duryodhana as an unredeemable villain. He is less evil than ill-starred—
proud, stubborn, unwilling to admit his
mistakes, and after a certain point,
unwilling to grant his cousins any
advantage. These character flaws are
magnified by the lack of strong guidance from his father Dhrtarashtra, and
eventually spell his doom.
The rift between the cousins develops early, inflamed in part by the fact
that the Pandavas are more heroic than
Duryodhana and his brothers. As a
child, Bhima, the Pandava brother best
noted for his prodigious strength, used
to whip all hundred Kauravas at once.
Needless to say this does not endear him
to them. Later in adolescence, when
their archery teacher, Drona, requests
the capture of King Drupada as his preceptor’s fee, the Pandava brother Arjuna
succeeds in doing this, whereas
Drupada defeats Duryodhana in battle.
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Duryodhana
Another rift grows when the Pandavas
contest the right of Duryodhana’s friend
Karna to take part in an archery match,
claiming that Karna’s unknown parentage makes him unfit to compete with
kings. Duryodhana skirts that issue by
proclaiming Karna as the King of Anga,
but by then the bad blood between the
cousins is well-established.
This bad blood becomes apparent
in many different plots. Duryodhana
first tries to kill the Pandavas by building a flammable house of lac for them,
which is then set on fire. The Pandavas,
however, are able to escape unharmed.
Duryodhana later entices Yudhishthira
(a Pandava brother) into a game of dice.
Yudhishthira wagers and loses everything that he has, including himself, his
brothers, and their common wife
Draupadi. After this loss Duryodhana
and his brother Duhshasana publicly
humiliate Draupadi, after which Bhima
swears a solemn oath to kill them both.
Dhrtarashtra gives the Pandavas their
freedom, which they promptly lose in
yet another game of dice. The outcome
of this loss is that the Pandavas agree to
spend twelve years in exile in the forest,
and live incognito for the thirteenth,
with the condition that if they are discovered in the thirteenth year the cycle
will begin anew.
Despite the best efforts of Duryodhana’s
spies, the Pandavas manage to escape
detection during the thirteenth year,
and at its conclusion send envoys to
Duryodhana to claim their share of the
kingdom. Perhaps emboldened by
Yudhishthira’s comment that he and his
brothers will be satisfied with a mere
five villages, Duryodhana replies that he
will not give them enough land to put
under the point of a needle. In the face
of such stubbornness and injustice, the
Pandavas prepare for war to claim what
is rightfully theirs. During the war
Duryodhana fights valiantly, but in the
eighteen days of battle sees his forces
disintegrate around him. His final battle
is with Bhima, who in exchange for
Duryodhana’s earlier insult to Draupadi
(he had directed her to sit on his thigh,
which was a euphemism for the
genitals), smashes Duryodhana’s thigh
with his mace, killing him.