By collection
Folk & Classical Stories
Regional folk traditions and classical nested story cycles share this collection. Distinct works and recensions remain separate.
Published: 0 · In catalogue: 0

The complete collection
Folk Tales of India
Explore Indian folk and literary stories by region, storyteller or named work. The collection names help you choose a voice and keep its identity, whether you came for a familiar tale or something your family has not read before.
- Series
- 21
- Books
- 0
- Published
- 0
Included in this collection
The collection option covers the books across all series below. Digital reading and available narration are included; print is separate. Check each book page for age editions, Book/Ebook previews and language availability.
The whole collection is not yet available to purchase. The listed price is shown; release and purchase dates are not confirmed. Annual membership covers the available digital library.
Explore all included series ↓Choose your first collection
Tenali Raman & Friends
The wit of Vijayanagara, with the court wits of Delhi and the Hindustani wise fool as sub-shelves.
Published: 0 · In catalogue: 0
Vikram and Betal Twenty-five riddles from the tree.
Published: 0 · In catalogue: 0
The Ocean of Stories Eighteen lambakas, 124 tarangas.
Published: 0 · In catalogue: 0
Series · 21
Gujarati Lok-katha
Tales Ba tells.
Published: 0 · In catalogue: 0
Rajasthani Tales
Dhola-Maru, Pabuji, the desert's own stories.
Published: 0 · In catalogue: 0
Thakurmar Jhuli
Grandmother's bag of Bengali tales.
Published: 0 · In catalogue: 0
Tamil Tales
Paatti's stories from the south.
Published: 0 · In catalogue: 0
Aithihyamala
Kerala's garland of legends.
Published: 0 · In catalogue: 0
Punjabi Tales
Folk tales of the five rivers.
Published: 0 · In catalogue: 0
Marathi Tales
Aaji's stories.
Published: 0 · In catalogue: 0
Odia Tales
Stories from the land of Jagannath.
Published: 0 · In catalogue: 0
Assamese Tales
Burhi Aair Sadhu: grandmother's tales.
Published: 0 · In catalogue: 0
Kashmiri Tales
Stories from the valley.
Published: 0 · In catalogue: 0
Brihatkatha (The Great Narrative) A lost narrative tradition known through later adaptations, including Kathasaritsagara and Brihatkathamanjari.
Published: 0 · In catalogue: 0
Shukasaptati (Seventy Tales of the Parrot) A parrot keeps Prabhavati at home with nightly stories while her merchant husband is away. The cycle later inspired the Persian Tutinama.
Published: 0 · In catalogue: 0
Simhasana Dvatrimsika (Singhasan Battisi) Thirty-two figures associated with Vikramaditya’s throne recount his generosity and courage as King Bhoja considers whether he is worthy of it.
Published: 0 · In catalogue: 0
Dashakumaracharita (The Tale of the Ten Princes) A prose romance of ten young men whose adventures move through courts, cities, deception, love and changing fortunes.
Published: 0 · In catalogue: 0
Silappadikaram (The Tale of an Anklet) Kannagi seeks justice after Kovalan is wrongly executed. This Tamil epic connects Puhar, Madurai and Vanchi through loss, kingship and the power of her protest.
Published: 0 · In catalogue: 0
Kadambari An intricate prose romance of love, separation and rebirth, told through nested narrators. Bana belonged to the literary world of King Harsha.
Published: 0 · In catalogue: 0
Gatha Saptashati (Seven Hundred Verses) Short lyric poems evoke village life, desire, love and separation. These are poetic vignettes rather than a continuous epic.
Published: 0 · In catalogue: 0
Brihatkathamanjari (The Great Tale’s Garland) Kshemendra’s condensed verse retelling preserves another strand of the lost Brihatkatha tradition alongside Somadeva’s larger collection.
Published: 0 · In catalogue: 0
Regional folk traditions and classical nested story cycles share this collection. Distinct works and recensions remain separate.
- History
- Oral traditions and authored Sanskrit, Prakrit and regional-language literature have different histories. A surviving retelling is not the lost Brihatkatha original.
- Authenticity of our versions
- One primary original-language edition per work. Edition, completeness, competing recensions and exact-file terms must be compared before selection. Located references are candidates; no primary edition is certified yet.
- Source selection
- One primary original-language edition per work. Edition, completeness, competing recensions and exact-file terms must be compared before selection. Located references are candidates; no primary edition is certified yet.
3 whole-work / guide slots · sequence planned · source comparison pending
Source work → collection → book series → authored books. A slot is metadata, not a finished manuscript, a paid edition or a release.
Classical story cycles · 2 works / topics
Kathasaritsagara
Somadeva's 18 lambakas and 124 tarangas; interwoven narratives, not 124 automatically finished storybooks.
11th-century Kashmir; surviving Sanskrit composition in the Brihatkatha tradition.
Primary source: selection pending. Book series: whole-work preparation slot. Books: no new storybook created by this plan.
Retained candidate: Kathasaritsagara (Ocean of the Streams of Stories) · This surviving Sanskrit work is distinct from Gunadhya’s lost Paishachi text. Coverage, edition identity, rights and age adaptation review remain pending.
Edition comparison notes · selection pending
The GRETIL header names Durgaprasad and Parab's Nirnaya-Sagar 1915 edition. It discloses silently corrected print typos and incomplete footnotes/chayas. Its 145 extracted sections cannot be equated with the traditional 124 tarangas without a division crosswalk.
- GRETIL: 1915 print-based transcription
Full HTML header checked; CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 file terms. Whole-text collation pending.
- Historical Sanskrit print candidate
Scan reference located; title page, edition and complete page coverage not yet verified.
Still to validate: Inspect the named print and map the 18 lambakas / 124 tarangas to saved sections. Compare the print's readings with the transcription before choosing the whole-work primary.
Research references only. These links do not add an active source edition or approve a book.
- GRETIL: 1915 print-based transcription
Vetala Panchavimshati (Vikram and Betaal)
Twenty-five-tale cycle; Somadeva, Shivadasa and other recensions must be compared. A Hindi adaptation or Burton selection is not the complete Sanskrit original.
Multiple Sanskrit recensions. Choose and name one; do not claim a universal original.
Primary source: selection pending. Book series: whole-work preparation slot. Books: no new storybook created by this plan.
Retained candidate: Vetala Panchavimshati (Baital Pachisi) · Do not attribute the whole collection to Bhavabhuti. Burton’s selection is not a complete Sanskrit edition of all 25 tales. Coverage, edition identity, rights and age adaptation review remain pending.
Edition comparison notes · selection pending
The retained source is Somadeva's cycle inside Kathasaritsagara 12.8.21–12.32.41, with framing material and 25 tales. It is not an independent witness of Shivadasa's recension. Its reference-only header inherits the source file's terms.
- GRETIL: Somadeva recension and reference scheme
Header and opening inspected; printed-edition and exact-file terms comparison pending.
Still to validate: Compare the Somadeva text against a named Shivadasa print and other surviving recensions. If Somadeva is chosen, reuse the parent work's passage span rather than creating another copy of the same source.
Research references only. These links do not add an active source edition or approve a book.
- GRETIL: Somadeva recension and reference scheme
Folk traditions · 1 works / topics
Regional folk traditions
Preserve existing named regional collections and their source languages; collect one attributed source per named work.
Community, teller, collector and printed witness are distinct provenance fields.
Primary source: selection pending. Book series: whole-work preparation slot. Books: no new storybook created by this plan.
Matching stories: 0
No published story in this selection yet
Try fewer filters, or explore the full catalogue to see what is being prepared. Publication status is separate from the age and language options on a book.
Published stories →By collection →Reading this collection together
- Start with one episode
- Choose one published tale and preview it for the listener’s age. Folk and literary collections can contain difficult themes; a playful title is not an age rating.
- What to notice
- A remembered family version may differ from the edition here. Name that difference instead of silently joining the two accounts.
- A question to share
- Does someone in your family remember another telling? Share the memory after reading and say where you heard it.