Ugrashravas was the narrator of several Puranas

Puranas

The Puranas are a genre of important Hindu, Jain and Buddhist religious texts, notably consisting of narratives of the history of the universe from creation to destruction, genealogies of kings, heroes, sages, and demigods, and descriptions of Hindu cosmology, philosophy, and geography.Puranas...

, including Mahābhārata

Mahabharata

The Mahabharata is one of the two major Sanskrit epics of ancient India and Nepal, the other being the Ramayana. The epic is part of itihasa....

, Bhagavata Purana

Bhagavata purana

The Bhāgavata Purāṇa is one of the "Maha" Puranic texts of Hindu literature, with its primary focus on bhakti to the incarnations of Vishnu, particularly Krishna...

, Harivamsa

Harivamsa

The Harivamsha is an important work of Sanskrit literature, containing 16,374 verses, mostly in metre. The text is also known as . This text is believed as a khila to the Mahabharata and is traditionally ascribed to Krishna Dvaipayana Veda Vyasa...

, and Padma Purana

Padma Purana

Padma Purana , one of the major eighteen Puranas, a Hindu religious text, is divided into five parts.In the first part of the text, sage Pulastya explains to Bhishma about religion and the essence of the religion. The second part describes in detail Prithvi...

, with the narrations typically taking place before the sages gathered in Naimisha Forest

Naimisha Forest

Naimisha Forest or Naimiṣāraṇya was an ancient forest mentioned in the epic Mahabharata and the Shiva Purana. It lay on the banks of the Gomati River . It lay between the Panchala Kingdom and the Kosala Kingdom...

. He was the son of Lomaharshana (or Romaharshana), and a disciple of Vyasa

Vyasa

Vyasa is a central and revered figure in most Hindu traditions. He is also sometimes called Veda Vyasa , or Krishna Dvaipayana...

, the author of Mahābhārata. Ugrasrava belonged to the Suta

Suta

Sūta refers both to the bards of Puranic stories and to a mixed caste. According to Manu Smriti the sūta caste are children of a Kshatriya father and Brahmin mother. The narrator of the several of the Puranas, Ugrasrava Sauti, son of Lomaharshana, was also called Sūta. Authorities are divided on...

 caste, who were typically the bards of Puranic literature.

The entire Mahābhārata epic was structured as a dialogue between Ugrasrava Sauti (the narrator) and sage Saunaka (the listener). The narration (Bharata) of the history of Bharata kings by sage Vaisampayana

Vaisampayana

Vaishampayana was the traditional narrator of the Mahabharata, one of the two major Sanskrit epics of ancient India. He was an ancient Indian sage who was the original teacher of the Black Yajur-Veda. The Ashvalayana Grihya Sutra mentions him as Mahabharatacharya...

 to Kuru

Kuru Kingdom

Kuru was the name of an ancient kingdom in Vedic India, and later a republican Mahajanapada state. The kingdom was located in the area of modern Haryana, Delhi and western Uttar Pradesh in India. They formed the first political center of the of the Vedic India, with its capital at Hastinapur. It...

 king Janamejaya

Janamejaya

Janamejaya was a Kuru king. He was the son of Parikshit and Madravati. He was the grandson of Abhimanyu and the great-grandson of Arjuna, the valiant warrior hero of the Mahābhārata. He was ascended to the Kuru throne following the death of his father. His significance comes as the listener of the...

 was embedded within this narration of Ugrasrava Sauti. Vaisampayana's narration (Jaya) in turn contains the narration of Kurukshetra War

Kurukshetra war

According to the Indian epic poem Mahābhārata, a dynastic succession struggle between two groups of cousins of an Indo-Aryan kingdom called Kuru, the Kauravas and Pandavas, for the throne of Hastinapura resulted in the Kurukshetra War in which a number of ancient kingdoms participated as allies of...

 by Sanjaya

Sanjaya

Sanjaya is a character from the ancient Indian epic Mahābhārata.In Mahabharata, a story of war between the Pandavas and the Kauravas, the blind king Dhritarashtra is the father of the principals of the Kaurava side. Sanjaya is Dhritarashtra's advisor and also his charioteer...

, to Kuru

Kuru Kingdom

Kuru was the name of an ancient kingdom in Vedic India, and later a republican Mahajanapada state. The kingdom was located in the area of modern Haryana, Delhi and western Uttar Pradesh in India. They formed the first political center of the of the Vedic India, with its capital at Hastinapur. It...

 king Dhritarashtra

Dhritarashtra

In the Mahābhārata, Dhritarashtra was King of Hastinapur at the time of the Kurukshetra War, the epic's climactic event. He was born the son of Vichitravirya's first wife Ambika, and was fathered by Vyasa. He was blind from birth, and became father to a hundred children by his wife Gandhari...

. Thus Mahābhārata

Mahabharata

The Mahabharata is one of the two major Sanskrit epics of ancient India and Nepal, the other being the Ramayana. The epic is part of itihasa....

 has as a Story within a story

Story within a story

A story within a story, also rendered story-within-a-story, is a literary device in which one narrative is presented during the action of another narrative. Mise en abyme is the French term for a similar literary device...

 structure.

The Mahābhārata begins by introducing Ugrasrava:

"Ugrasrava, the son of Lomaharshana, surnamed Sauti, well-versed in the Puranas

Puranas

The Puranas are a genre of important Hindu, Jain and Buddhist religious texts, notably consisting of narratives of the history of the universe from creation to destruction, genealogies of kings, heroes, sages, and demigods, and descriptions of Hindu cosmology, philosophy, and geography.Puranas...

, bending with humility, one day approached the great sages of rigid vows, sitting at their ease, who had attended the twelve year sacrifice of Saunaka, surnamed Kulapati, in the forest of Naimisha

Naimisha Forest

Naimisha Forest or Naimiṣāraṇya was an ancient forest mentioned in the epic Mahabharata and the Shiva Purana. It lay on the banks of the Gomati River . It lay between the Panchala Kingdom and the Kosala Kingdom...

." (Mahabharata 1:1)