The Unhero brings together philosophy and history, weaving the threads of existentialism and the saga of the civilisations of the Indus Valley and Mesopotamia into the lives of ordinary men and women living in an extraordinary time, confronted with excruciatingly difficult choices.
When you think of ancient civilisations, images of primitive men and women with lofty palaces, grand temples and esoteric, mystical practices probably go through your mind.
But, the Indus Valley civilisation in the Indian subcontinent, spread over an area a dozen times that of contemporary Mesopotamia and Egypt combined, separated by more than 5,000 years from our time, was devoid of all such vanities to the egos of men and their Gods.
No grand palaces to emperors and no monumental shrines to Gods built with the sweat of ordinary men and women were to be seen in the Indus Valley. Instead, a peaceful civilisation, shunning the barbarism of expansionism and aggressive warfare, focused its energies on art and craft, engineering, and trade to emerge as a beacon of rational existence; an object of envy even for us today in a supposedly far more enlightened age.
Yet, even the Indus Valley civilisation could not escape its fate. Ravaged by the fury of nature, as well as the envy and barbarism of invaders, nearly all traces of this wondrous civilisation were wiped off the face of the earth, lost to history for more than 3,300 years. It was only in the 1920s that news of the existence of such a people was made known to the world.
It is given to few generations to have to live through the tumultuous fall of a civilisation, particularly such a one as that of the Indus Valley. Yet, those who do must find answers to the most difficult questions of their lives.
What should an ordinary men or women do in such extraordinary times? What of duty? Must one make the greatest sacrifice- giving up one's life for one's land, in what can only be a hopeless cause? What of the glory of war, and a person's honour and prestige in the eyes of men and women who are but strangers?
And what can an ordinary person do to oppose the flow of history, even if he or she wanted to do something?
The Unhero is the story of how ordinary men and women seek to find their answers to these questions in their own ways.
