The Prem Sagur Of Lallu Lal

The Prem Sagur of Lallu Lal

Translated by W. Hollings


The Prem Sagar was one of the first books published in modern Hindi. It is the tale of the deeds of Krishna, the invincible avatar of Vishnu. Based on the tenth book of the Bhagavata Purana, the Prem Sagar, which means 'Ocean of Love,' (one of Krishna's epithets) was composed by Lallu Lal between 1804 and 1810. Lallu Lal's retelling of this traditional cycle of legends of Krishna is distinguished by naturalistic dialog and frank sensuality. While the Prem Sagar is not considered part of Hindu scripture per se, it is popular because it makes this portion of the Purana narrative accessible to Hindi speakers who don't know Sanskrit. Instead of doing 90 individual chapters, I have split this into 9 Parts, with 10 chapters in each, because of time restraints.