why ravana is my hero and not rama

i am so glad that my first post on ravana stirred a debate which was on expected lines.  i am also glad to see views  on ravana by my good friends reinforcing views albiet traditional saying him to be a scholar but  "arrogant" , ego centric etc..

I have worked on this topic for couple of years and every word that i speak can be verified and autheticated. I have read alternate books, spoken to "genuine" spiritual masters and last but not the least self-contemplated on various modes of facts presented.  I have always  greatly believed in being an observer or "analyst" ( sounds more managerial ) in life without forming an opinion. I leave that part (forming opinions) to my esteemed readers.  Unfortunately most of the facts that people have come from the  popular folklores, Valmiki's Ramayana and TV serial !!!

Firstly I dont see these two gentleman (Ram and Ravana) as demons or gods (or avtaaras) but as mortal beings who occupied a prominent place in history during the pre indus valley civilization. while the dates are disputed but what can be inferred with their timings is some time during the famous "Atlantis" when the geogrpahical structure of the earth was different than we see at present. We all have now agreed that due to continental drift  all the continents are drifting apart. During the occurence of Ramayana , the continents were closely knit. Which means one could traverse Australia , by land itself. In the alternate perspective book on Ravana called "vayam rakshamah" debunks the myths that have been prevealent for time immemorial. For example , the "Narak" or Hell was the old name of Persia ,  "Vaikunth" was a name of a place in Iran and Rakshasas were Maritime People who primarily dwelled on Seas. "Patal" or underground as its commonlyy known was modern day Australia because it was the southern part of continental land. So who were these "devatas" and  "Rakshas".  It was a clash of races and civilizations. two specific tribes, Devtas were more "European" whitish in race as compared to Rakshaasa who were colored, and as in human social modelling , color always looses to white.  Rakshas (which means protection) were demonized permanently in history.

Their was a historical battle for the control of earth and resources. which is still on between these two races. So it was methodical and surgical way of telling your story. Please remember its the same tactics which British have employed. They systematically destroyed the Indian form of education and replaced it with that of Lord Macaulay's system of education. what we have read is British interptetion of history. Our "gurukul" for example had subjects like Logic, Grammer and Mathematics, the 3 pillars of any educational system but was destroyed. Its said that if you want to destroy any country "rewrite its history" and thats what happened. Rakshasas were hardworking and nature worshipping tribes and races who won all battles. Devtas were tactiticans who always wanted to win over through "any" means.

Ravana was a cross breed and had both characteristics.  He was a master scholar in medicine, mathematics,astronomy, astrology . He has written many books  like "Arka Shastra" .  in arka shastra he has compiled every herb its usage and dosage revealing cures to some complex dieases.In one book he wrote "Eating beef cause to infect ninety eight new diseases to human beings". The book "Kumara Tantraya" (Gynecology and Peadetric Medicine) which reveals the treatments for infant diseases was written by him accepting the request of his pregnant queen Mandodari. He has similarly written many books on astrology and also created new  Raagas in Music , esp in Sama Veda , our 4th veda. He was such an eloquent master that he controlled Navagrahas (the nine "grahas" aspects of human astro system). I can go on and on his scholarly pursuits. Meanwhile the Ravana having 10 heads is nonsense, he was a master in tantra and had created an optical  illusion of  soughts while fighting his enemies. In fact in the famous Book "ravana samhita" an excellent compliation of his scholarly works is give,

He is said to be one of the greatest physicians who ever existed, and even authored the book Arka Prakashaya. The Bisajjya Grantha and Nadi Shasthra mentions that King Ravana and his grandfather Pulasthi Muni had graced the world-famous medical conferences held in those ancient days in Janasthan Pura near Pakistan. In Sri Lankan folk tales, it is said that king Ravana treated both Rama and Lakshmana with his own hand when they were badly injured on the battlefield.

The only King of Sri Lanka who managed to wipe out all the divisions among the Sri Lankan people was the Great King Ravana. Under his leadership, King Ravana managed to unite all the Sri Lankan tribes. Sri Lanka became a secular country not subject to or bound by any religious dogma, with no official religion, language or official yes men. Not only ruling Sri Lanka, he governed a vast kingdom with boundaries extending over South Asia – and was hence named Chakravarthi. In chronological records about Ravana, it is almost impossible to find a single battle fought against another community of people in order to invade their land or usurp their throne. Not a single ‘racial’ conflict is mentioned in any of those records written during his reign, though the chronicle of the Ramayana by Valmiki stereotyped him as the most evil human to have ever existed, providing an erroneous and biased interpretation of the Rama-Ravana war.

well then if he was such a great scholar , why was he wronged ? well for this the first nonsense has to be cleared  which is Rama and Ravana fought wars because of Sita, it was a political war which predated Rama. as mentioned, Ravana's maternal side (Raksh Tribes) were driven out of their own  land by Devtas tribes.  Rama belived in a doctrine (quoted) " The entire earth belongs to Raghu Vansh " Raghu was the ancestor of Rama. This sounds like the more racist quote ofBritish  Rudyard Kipling in which he called colonization or imperliamsm as a "white man's burden". Anyways , Ravana won back Lanka from Kuber (his step brother) and turned it into riches. Lanka was an object of envy ..  

Ravana and Shiva propogated the greatest theory of modern humanism which is their is no greater force than human will power.  "Atma so Paramatma" meaning soul is the the ultimate or what jesus has said " father and son are one" was rendered by these two gentleman which ran odds with people who had commercialized, objectified and "branded" gods for self interest. 

ravana also debunked caste system as in Vedas and Upanishads (original ones, if you want to see original Vedas, go to Germany not India.. what a pity ) as nowhere caste has been mentioned.

Raksh tribe believed in nature worship and universal identity without any bias for caste or creed and gender. The other tribes had deep caste divides and wanted to keep that alive.  Ravana was a master of 10 vidyas or 10 forms of knowledge another symbolic representation of his infamous "10 heads". Ravana as a social refomer took this message deep down to other tribal areas albiet by force which were at odds with the social fabric.

He propogated "Raksh Neeti" which meant equality for all. The other rulers were ought to get distressed who wanted the demarcation to be preserved. Fast forwarding to famous Shurpanka's episode,  Shurpanka was appointed as the "Governor" of the region where Ram , Lakshman and Sita had entered.  As the present norm states, an unauthorized entry amounted to aggression, unfortunately, which was taken up by Shurpanaka. The famous "enticement" which again has been demonized by popular folk lore and TV serials is silent on this issue. In "vayam rakshamah" its beautifully  argued that Shurpanka was unjustly manhandled. Imagine a girl (who happens to the queen) , in all fairness assuming asked for marriage is manhandled, beaten and have had her nose cut, its so unbecoming of  a man. Our eye brows were raised recently when women were attacked at a pub, how about this now ? isnt it inhuman, firstly you enter a territory which is not yours, then you manhandle the chieftan ? and that too when she is a women, where is the culture  ? . ravana avenged it with taking away Sita not just for this but as a political move, and please remember that he never ill-treated. My friends argue that he was cursed etc etc ,where was the curse when he could lift her and take her on his "Vimana" ? another big interpetitition was that he wanted to marry her. Nonsense, he actually had gone to the Swayamvar of Sita to ask her for his son "Indrajit" not for himself. he kept her with dignity in  AshokVatika. 

now the famous battle scene and its little pre history. 

Rama wanted to construct the famous "sethu" and needed a pandit to do the commencement puja or ritual.  The only pandit nearby was Ravana, the best amongst all. Ravana came and performed Puja for his "enemy" dutifully and blessed him. If this arrogance, be it..

Rama wanted to pick an auspicious time to start the battle. Rama needed an astrologer. Everyone unanimously suggested none other than Ravana. Heeding to the suggestion, Rama went to ravana to ask him a good time. Ravana as a great professional gave him the best muhurtha which (9 navaratris) and blessed him with "Vijaya Bhava". I have never seen a bigger human being than this. Is this arrogance , then I am arrogant, i would love to be..

Finally Rama tired of all weaponry , picked up his Brahmaastra , equivalent of nuclear weapon in modern age. This weapon technically was never supposed to be used in war as it was more of a deterrance. Ravana had this weapon as well. But seeing Rama open this weapon, Ravana did not open his Brahmastra (which he had) because he knew that had he done that , entire humanity and ecology would have been finished, imagine 2 hydrogen bombs colliding. He opted out and gladly accepted death and defeat for the larger purpose.

In fact before his death, Ravana makes a request to Rama to protect the Humanity and Ecology to its fullest !

One of thing that I have observed in human sociology, a person who questions beliefs , assumptions and values  and explores truth impartially   is always painted black .. ravana was just one of them..

Carmakers need to let go of their musty business models and start thinking like 21st century companies—like Google -excerpt from

Detroit Should Get Cracking on its Googlemobile

Carmakers need to let go of their musty business models and start thinking like 21st century companies—like Google

By Jeff Jarvis

If Google (GOOG) ran a car company, what would it look like? What lessons of Google's singular success in the Internet age might apply to remaking this, among other failing industries? Would the Googlemobile be the product of stealth and secrecy or openness and collaboration? Could Detroit release cars in beta? Could cars be ad-supported and free? Is there any hope for an industry that traffics in atoms instead of digits? Would a Googley car company even make cars?

A few years ago, it might have been absurd to look to Google for ideas about the auto industry. But not now. American automakers are in crisis. General Motors (GM) and Chrysler needed a $13 billion bailout from the federal government in December to keep them out of bankruptcy, and, with a new Administration in Washington, the Big Three are likely to head back to the well for billions more. They're suffering from more than the economic crisis. The huge declines in sales reflect a fundamental disconnect between drivers and Detroit. It's time for a radical rethinking of the way U.S. automakers do business.

I sat in Detroit some time ago and suggested heresy: I urged the car people to open up their design process and make it both transparent and collaborative. Car companies have no good way to listen to customers' ideas. If they had opened up, years before, I would have been among the legions who'd have gladly told them to invest 39 cents for a plug-in car radio so we could connect our iPods. Every time I try to listen to my music or podcasts in the car via various kludges—FM transmitters that can't transmit to a radio an inch away and cassette-tape gizmos—I curse car companies and their suppliers. At least let us help design the radios you install, I urged.

THE BIG THREE DON'T WANT TO HEAR IT

My suggestion was sacrilegious because automakers have long been secretive about design. Design and surprise, they think, are their special sauce. That's why they cloak new models like classified weapons, setting off games of cat-and-car with photographers who try to scoop the secrets. Apart from the most fanatical car fan, do the rest of us still care? The excitement I remember about a new year's cars—like a new season's TV shows—is gone. Cars have lost their season. They rarely engender excitement or passion. An Oldsmobile is no Apple (AAPL) iPhone, after all. How could a car company again win our affection for its products and brands? By opening up, by making the process of producing cars transparent so it could involve customers, by turning out cars customers want because they had a chance to say what they want.

Google listens to us and trusts us when it releases unfinished products as "betas" so we can tell them what to do next. That's the approach behind Google News, Gmail, and the new Chrome browser. The company also lets us tailor searches so we turn up only images or book excerpts. And Google pays attention to us by using our clicks and links to determine rank in search results. The more people who connect to a blog post on the best recipe for lamb tagine, the more prominent Google will make that Web site when people hunt for dinner ideas.

Google wants us involved in the creative process; Detroit doesn't. On Peter Day's BBC program In Business, Richard Florida, author of Who's Your City?, said Detroit's car companies were "destroyed" by "a management mind set that said, 'We know it all, we don't need anyone other's ideas, and we can do anything we want with our companies.' "

Car companies have let customers make emblems for cars and create their own ads for certain models, as General Motors did with the Chevy Tahoe in 2006. GM Vice-Chairman Bob Lutz has blogged. Chrysler has solicited customers' ideas (in a closed forum that prevents them from commenting on each others' suggestions) and created a customer advisory board of 5,000 selected drivers. The problem with these efforts is that they don't allow customers to affect the product openly. An idea presented to Ford Motor via e-mail or to Mini in its popular online community might influence a decision that will come off the line in a few years. But we'd never know it. Indeed, these preliminary attempts at interactivity seem aimed at keeping the customer from doing harm. This is interactivity as defined by a children's museum: Here are the buttons you may push without breaking anything; knock yourself out, kids. But just as companies should hand over their brands to customers, so should they hand over their products. Let the customers make the cars.

SAMENESS IN AN AGE OF EXPRESSION

What if just one model from one brand were opened up to collaborative design? I don't suggest that design should be a democracy. But shouldn't design at least be a conversation? Designers can put their ideas on the Web. Customers can make suggestions and discuss them. Designers can take the best ideas and adapt them, giving credit where it is due. I don't imagine customers would collaborate on transmission design—though a few might have good suggestions if given a chance. But they would have a lot to contribute on the passenger compartment, the look of the car, the features, and the options. They could even get involved in economic decisions: Would you be willing to give up power windows if it got you a lower price or a nicer radio? This collaboration would invest customers in the product. It would build excitement. It would get the product talked about on the Web and linked to and boost its popularity in Google searches. The approach could change the relationship of customers to the brand and that would change the brand itself. Imagine that, the collaborative community car: our car.

A car company could take an existing brand and work with the community that already exists around it. Go to Facebook and you'll find communities of greater or lesser involvement and affection devoted to many car brands. I stopped counting the Facebook groups for BMW when I hit 500—including the "If the BMW M5 was a woman I would marry it" group, with more than 800 members. The online gatherings site Meetup has six clubs where people organize get-togethers for drives in their Beemers. BMW also has an official car club offering 75,000 members rebates on cars and discounts on Brooks Brothers clothes. (Do they see the demographic humor in that?) These are the company's best customers—its partners. BMW should solicit their help in designing cars, in giving advice to fellow customers (there's a little of that in the club forums), even in selling cars.

On Facebook, BMW invited customers to color pictures of its car. It's hard to imagine something more children's museum-like than a company enticing adults to color cars. But more than 9,000 people submitted their designs in only a few days. What that tells me is not just that they love their BMWs but that they would love BMWs that look different—BMWs that express their muses as well as their libidos.

What an opportunity the industry has to bring humanity and personality back to cars. If so many of us like to express ourselves in blogs, YouTube videos, Facebook, Bebo, MySpace, and Flickr—if, as Google understands, many of us want to have a strong identity online through self-expression—why wouldn't we want to express ourselves through our cars? Companies have turned their products into commodities by imposing such sameness on them. I know, it's about efficiency: four models built under four brands on the same body with the same parts, making them cheaper. But the joy of customizing our own cars was taken away by factory efficiencies and dealer economics: We buy off the lot, not out of the factory, and we buy cars that are often loaded, like cable subscriptions, with things we don't want. Sure, there's an aftermarket of options—piney scent strips, hubcaps that spin, mud flaps with mirrors in the shape of naked women—but, well, that's just not me.

Toyota's (TM) Scion moved toward personalization when it let drivers design crests for their cars. Now take the next step and imagine I could take an unpainted car to any of those designers on Facebook or my student the graffiti artist and have my car painted so that it looks like no other. It'll cost me. But I'll bond with that car and love it because it's mine, an expression of me. That unpainted car would be the beginning of an auto company thinking open-source. What if the company also produced a car onto which I could graft another company's dashboard or seats or grille or engine? I tell news organizations to do what they do best on the Web and link to the rest. A car company could do the same.

Google replaced its fleet of company cars with Toyota Prius hybrids modified so their extra batteries could be recharged at solar charging stations. There is the Googlemobile. Google treated the Prius as a platform. Toyota should be delighted. It should build in opportunities to modify its car in countless ways. I can hear the objections: It could complicate production, raise costs, raise prices, confuse brands. Maybe. But it also could give me the car I want. The car company of the future could be a platform on which drivers create the automobiles they want, instead of settling for what's available.

There are projects aimed at building the open-source car, among them OScar from Germany, the c,mm,n (or common) hydrogen car from universities in the Netherlands, and the Society for Sustainable Mobility. But it's damned difficult to get a car company operating at scale. Atoms are a drag.

"NAVIGATION AND ENTERTAINMENT"

That is why I think a car company that already operates at scale should go open-source and welcome these nascent efforts to build atop them. Imagine seeing a million Priuses, Saturns, Fords, Accords (HMC), or electric Apteras on the road and wondering what's inside each one, what makes them run, who painted them, where you can get that great grille: cars no longer as mass-market products but as the product of a mass of niches. Imagine being given the power to customize your car from the ground up. Cars would be exciting again. Such openness would give me control of my car so I will own that brand, make that brand, love that brand, and sell that brand because it is mine, not yours.

That will be the key to marketing Googlemobiles: passion, love, individuality, innovation, choice, excitement, newness. Drivers will not only help design cars but also sell them—better than any car salesman can. They'll start Facebook groups, blogs, and Meetup clubs extolling the wonders of the cars they choose—no, make. Outside product designers and manufacturers will accessorize and improve the open-source car—just like outside developers have created thousands of software applications for the iPhone—which will support new businesses and help sell more cars. There is the advantage to being a platform as Google is a platform.

Creating a platform is a key reason for Google's success and it can apply to many industries. Craigslist founder Craig Newmark is doing much the same thing with the classifieds business. He created an open, easy-to-use service, and then let users do pretty much whatever they wanted with it. They've taken Craigslist in directions Newmark could have never imagined. What if cable companies, banks, even universities let the people have that kind of control? In the Google age, when anyone can talk about you, your product becomes your ad and your customers your ad agency.

I discussed my rationale for the open-source car platform with Fred Wilson, a partner at the venture firm Union Square Ventures in New York, and asked him what a Googley car company would look like. After thinking a moment, he said it already exists. It's Zipcar, which provides 5,000 cars to 200,000 drivers. Customers join Zipcar for $50 a month, then make reservations online and pick up a car in any number of garages, paying $9 an hour or $65 a day in New York, including insurance, gas, and 180 miles. One can get similar rates from traditional rental companies but with less flexibility and convenience. Zipcar says each of its cars replaces 15 privately owned vehicles and 40% of its members decide to give up owning a car. I know what you're thinking (and can hear the peals of laughter from Detroit): The last thing a car company should want is fewer cars. Are you nuts, Jarvis? Are you a communist or some tree-hugging fanatic? No. I'm just turning the industry upside-down.

When I asked adman Rishad Tobaccowala, chief innovation officer of the ad giant Publicis, which works in the auto industry, what business car companies are really in, he said it's not making cars. He channeled the Googley car company and said: "I'm in the business of moving people from place A to place B. How can I do it in different ways? And as they are moving from place A to place B, how do I make them feel secure and connected?" He said that aside from sleep, we spend more time moving around than at home. And what is the automobile really about? "Navigation and entertainment," he said. Not necessarily manufacturing. Manufacturing is expensive, vulnerable to commodity pricing, labor-intensive, and competitive. There's the tyranny of atoms vs. digits.

What if a car company became the leader in getting people around and it used others' hardware: planes, trains, and automobiles? I tell your system where I need to go and you give me choices at various price points: Today, I can take the train for less. Tomorrow, I can drive because I'm running errands. The day after, I'll carpool to save money. This weekend, I get a nice Mercedes to take my wife to dinner. Next week, I get a chauffeur-driven car to impress the clients. Along the way, I can pay for options: my entertainment synced in the car, wireless connectivity on the train, alerts to my iPhone, a navigation concierge who directs me around traffic jams. This is the new personal transportation company, a platform built on the old car company model. Hop aboard the Googlemobile.

my book of the week:what would google do

A bold and vital book that asks and answers the most urgent question of today: What Would Google Do?

In a book that's one part prophecy, one part thought experiment, one part manifesto, and one part survival manual, internet impresario and blogging pioneer Jeff Jarvis reverse-engineers Google—the fastest-growing company in history—to discover forty clear and straightforward rules to manage and live by. At the same time, he illuminates the new worldview of the internet generation: how it challenges and destroys, but also opens up vast new opportunities. His findings are counterintuitive, imaginative, practical, and above all visionary, giving readers a glimpse of how everyone and everything—from corporations to governments, nations to individuals—must evolve in the Google era.

Along the way, he looks under the hood of a car designed by its drivers, ponders a worldwide university where the students design their curriculum, envisions an airline fueled by a social network, imagines the open-source restaurant, and examines a series of industries and institutions that will soon benefit from this book's central question.

The result is an astonishing, mind-opening book that, in the end, is not about Google. It's about you.

About the Author

Jeff Jarvis is the proprietor of one of the Web's most popular and respected blogs about the internet and media, Buzzmachine.com. He also writes the new media column for theGuardian in London. He was named one of 100 worldwide media leaders by the World Economic Forum at Davos in 2007 and 2008, and he was the creator and founding editor ofEntertainment Weekly. He is on the faculty of the City University of New York Graduate School of Journalism in New York City.

leadership lessons from Ravana-1--intro

History is opinionated and biased , hardly any book that i have read on history where the biases of historian hasnt come into places.  History for me has to be more of accounts, facts and figures rather than moulding subjective opinions in the minds of the readers. Ramayana, our epic  , has to be first recognized as a piece of history assuming that the events " occured".  when history is interpreted in multiple facets why cant our mythology be the same. to do this i am starting this series on ravana and how i interpret his history from what i have researched about  him.. there along i will try to understand his leadership model and relevance in the present age..

Ravana is our first social reformer.. just to give an example he taught vedas to the so called " downtrodden" in society socially which was a pevilige of the few. He banned animal sacrifice , established a just rule

 Ravan was a hero allegedly turned into villain because he disagreed. He disagreed to norms and practices of the then civilization. He developed enmity because he was not a diplomat. Ravan was a laureate, a warrior, a fighter and above all a social reformer. Ravan collected all  together and formed “Rakcha Vansh” (Rakshas means protecting people). He gave downtrodden and discriminated a single voice, “Vyam Rakshamah” (the book in which ravana is decsribed as a true hero). Ravan gave the modern India’s concept of SOVEREIGN SOCIALIST SECULAR DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC. So Ravan was an educated rebel. He asked questions and that too right questions. And he had guts to argue and fight until the truth was revealed. So, sometimes he went out of his way too search answers and this shook the ego of people singlehandedly running the world at that time. Ravan questioned too much. Ravan had a mixed blood. His father was a Brahmin while his mother was from lineage of demons. So, he got the privilege to live in both the cultures. He could not find any difference between the two cultures except for the fact that demons were exploited and thought to be down trodden by Gods (people who read or wrote Vedas). 

Manage Energy not time..(comments on the article)

firstly i thanked god coz this read was required, my energy management was increasingly becoming inefficient.My crests and troughs were becoming and result my drain outs have become more frequent. In terms of my life i am at a present at a critical point of inflection and I need a good personal energy management to say the least, as my aspiration is increasingly towards building a social entrepreneurial model for which I need to devote optimal time and energy in my present business model and my aspired business model. My shortcomings are more towards physical agility. My "SuryaNamaskars and Pranayam" have gone for a toss for quite some time now and has to be revived at any cost. Besides getting 7hr sleep is ultra essential !. The most important change that i got after the read also has been to find a direct correlation b.w. my energy efficiency and my strategic goals. after all i am a strategist !

the Curious Case of Benjamin Button

the nominations for oscars have just been announced and picture which
has dominated other than slumdog "The Curious Case of Benjamin
Button"..

Read the plot:> i found it amazing wanna catch the movie.. been
longggggg since i saw one..

"The Curious Case of Benjamin Button" is a 1921 short story by F.
Scott Fitzgerald, first published in Colliers Magazine, and
subsequently anthologized in his book Tales of the Jazz Age
(occasionally published as The Curious Case of Benjamin Button and
Other Jazz Age Stories).[1] Developed for years by the late Hollywood
mogul Ray Stark, the rights and story development were purchased from
the Ray Stark Estate and adapted for a 2008 film of the same name
directed by David Fincher.


The story begins with the birth of the protagonist, Benjamin in 1860.
Benjamin is born with the physical appearance of a seventy-year-old
man, and when his father first visits him mere hours after his birth
he is already able to speak. To avoid embarrassment, Benjamin's father
forces him to shave his beard and dye his hair in order to look
younger. He also forces Benjamin to play with the other neighborhood
boys, and buys him toys and orders him throughout the day to play with
them. Benjamin obediently plays with them, but only to please his
father as Benjamin has more joy in smoking his father's cigars,
reading encyclopedias, and talking to his grandfather. He is even sent
to kindergarten at the age of five, but is quickly withdrawn from the
class after repeated instances of falling asleep during kid-oriented
activities.
As the story progresses it soon becomes apparent to the Button family
that Benjamin is aging backwards which astounds them beyond belief. At
the age of eighteen he enrolls in Yale University. However, having run
out of hair-dye on the day that he is supposed to register for
classes, the officials at Yale send him away believing that he is a
fifty-year-old lunatic.
Several years later, while attending a party with his father (who now
looks to be the same age as Benjamin), Benjamin meets the young
Hildegarde Moncrief, the daughter of a respected Civil War general.
Hildegarde tells Benjamin that she would rather be with an older man
because they treat women better. He dances with her, and they quickly
fall in love and marry. Benjamin soon takes over his father's hardware
business, and he proves to be highly adept at the job, while growing
fabulously rich.
As Benjamin "grows younger," he begins to feel healthier and happier,
as Fitzgerald says, "the blood flowed with new vigour through his
veins." However, his wife ceases to attract him as she ages, and he
soon decides to fight in the Spanish-American War. He serves with
great distinction and receives a medal for a wound he received at the
Battle of San Juan Hill. When he returns home his relationship with
his wife deteriorates further, and he becomes more detached from her.
He often leaves the house and goes to lavish parties and dances, while
his wife is more settled in her ways.
In 1910 Benjamin turns over control of his company to his son, Roscoe,
and enrolls at Harvard, with the appearance of a 20-year-old. His
first year at Harvard is a great success, and he dominates on the
football field. However, by the time Benjamin reaches his senior year
he is a frail sixteen-year-old too weak to play football and barely
able to cope with the academic load.
Benjamin returns home, and as the years progress he goes from being a
moody teenager to being a young boy and is reluctantly cared for by
his son. Eventually, he looks to be the same age as his own grandson,
and even attends kindergarten with him. As his body grows younger,
Button slowly begins to lose his memory of his earlier life. The toys
and games that he spurned as a newborn begin to interest him. As he
reaches the end of his life he becomes a baby, and his nurse Nana
takes him for walks and teaches him to say words. His memory
deteriorates to the point where he can't remember anything except the
immediate present, and eventually, all goes dark