Yeshe Tsogyal

Yeshe Tsogyal was a Princess in a small kingdom of many small kingdoms unified under Emperor Trisong Detsen in Tibet in the 8th century.  The history is, of course, more complex than this.  But I want to tell about why I wrote the novel...not give a history lesson.

There are books written about Yeshe Tsogyal, translated from a secret biography narrated and concealed by Yeshe Tsogyal herself. It was revealed by Terton Drime Kunga in Central Tibet in 14th century.  It was a terma text..I will write about these in another post.  

Her narration of her experience, her journey to enlightenment, is on a more esoteric level focusing on inner experiences and visions rather than conventional sequence of events in this text.
When I began my journey into Tibetan Buddhism, Vajrayana, I was very interested in the actual people in history that had traveled the path; I was interested in their life stories. 

So when I came upon the books that had translated the text written by this Princess I was enthralled. I have read every translation published of her account of her life. That was years ago in the 90's. They are very mystical and symbolic accounts of her life.

After reading and listening to many books on tape of historical fiction novels over the past years I decided I wanted to write an historical fiction account of her story from the viewpoint of a girl, grown into a woman, walking the earth. A real person having to get from here to there. A person with parents, friends and foes.  What her journey would look like from feet planted on the earth and in the context of what was happening in Tibet in that time in history; the swirl of life around her.  

I wanted to tell her story in a way that would be interesting to those people who are not particularly interested in Buddhism, people who would never pick up one of those books translated from the Tibetan text she wrote.  I want people to know about her, that there was a woman Buddha.

And for those people familiar with her and Buddhism, I felt it would be a nice change to read of this historical person in a novel, bringing her to life.

So for four years, having an hour before work every morning, I wrote her story.
It is now published and available on Amazon.  "Princess of Wisdom”