There may be no graphical symbol more reviled today than the swastika. In 1921 Hitler adopted the hakenkreuz, or hooked cross, as the logo for the Nazi party and later as the official German flag.

The swastika is an ancient Sanskrit symbol meaning “good fortune” or “well-being" and as been used by Hindus, Buddhists and Jains for millennia. But in the 1930s as the Nazis rose to power ...

It is late at night in Delhi, and hot. In New York, my class is about to start. We will begin reading a new poem today, a fifth-century court epic by the greatest of all Sanskrit poets, Kalidasa ...

I don't want to give too much away: how Love dies and becomes bodiless, Shiva's rage and Parvati's austerities, their spectacular union at the end of the poem and the sensuality of those last scenes.