Gandhi: A Life - Hardcover

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YOGESH CHADHA was born in Jammu, India and educated in India and England. After working in London and Toronto, he gave up all other commitments to write this biography. Mr. Chadha currently lives in New Delhi.

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"It is imperative that Gandhi is reclaimed as a human being out of the many myths surrounding him. He had his failings and favorites, but to suppress these weaknesses would be to undermine his strengths."—Yogesh Chadha.

In the first major biography of Mohandas K. Gandhi in over twenty years, Yogesh Chadha creates a complex, compelling, and beautifully rounded portrait of one of the monumental figures of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. This definitive new work is the culmination of eight years of writing and research, during which Chadha had complete access to Gandhi's voluminous writings and government papers only recently made available.

Gandhi: A Life rescues the man from the myth. It reveals the transformation of an ordinary, timid young man into a leader whose stand against a mighty empire brought millions together. From the poor and the illiterate to the intelligentsia and the rich, Gandhi's followers forged a sustained, nonviolent movement for independence.

When Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi was born in 1869, India was divided. British India, ruled by the Viceroy from Delhi, stood in stark contrast to the other India, a checkerboard of hundreds of princely states, royal instruments without political power. It was in one of these states, Porbandar, that Gandhi came of age, the youngest of three sons and a daughter of the dewan (prime minister) and his fourth wife. From his father, Gandhi inherited stubbornness, incorruptibility, and great practical sense; from his mother, a life of religion, devotion, and asceticism.

Shortly before his nineteenth birthday, Gandhi—by then a husband and father of several years—set sail from Bombay to England to study law; shortly thereafter, he traveled to South Africa to practice. An outsider, the young barrister tasted firsthand the bitter fruits of class prejudice, racial intolerance, and colonial oppression. At the same time, his pursuit of spiritual fulfillment and a keen curiosity about the world's diverse religions nourished Gandhi's own deeply felt convictions, pointing him toward the path along which he would guide India to independence.

In a work of far-reaching scope and revealing intimacy, Yogesh Chadha never loses sight of the man amidst the epic swirl of history. As he explores the key events in Gandhi's intellectual, spiritual, and political development, Chadha writes with total frankness, never shying away from the weaknesses and the more controversial aspects of both Gandhi's public and personal lives, including struggles with sexuality and celibacy. In addition, he exposes in depth for the first time the extraordinary events surrounding Gandhi's assassination, its planning and execution, and the subsequent trial.

Here is a magnificent biography that approaches its legendary subject with honesty and admiration—and without preconceptions. Gandhi: A Life is a brilliantly constructed and inspiring work.

"The first major biography to appear for twenty years . . . [with] a depth and authority which others have lacked."—The Independent (London).

"A compelling portrait . . . reveals that saints can be hell to live with."—The Mail on Sunday (London).

"[Yogesh Chadha] presents, in a sober and lucid fashion, the whole man, warts and all. The result is an impressive tour de force, a portrait infinitely more complex and contradictory than any before . . . outstanding."—The Scotsman.

"An outstanding reappraisal of an extraordinary man."—Irish Independent

Aus dem Klappentext

"It is imperative that Gandhi is reclaimed as a human being out of the many myths surrounding him. He had his failings and favorites, but to suppress these weaknesses would be to undermine his strengths." —Yogesh Chadha In the first major biography of Mohandas K. Gandhi in over twenty years, Yogesh Chadha creates a complex, compelling, and beautifully rounded portrait of one of the monumental figures of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. This definitive new work is the culmination of eight years of writing and research, during which Chadha had complete access to Gandhi’s voluminous writings and government papers only recently made available. Gandhi: A Life rescues the man from the myth. It reveals the transformation of an ordinary, timid young man into a leader whose stand against a mighty empire brought millions together. From the poor and the illiterate to the intelligentsia and the rich, Gandhi’s followers forged a sustained, nonviolent movement for independence. When Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi was born in 1869, India was divided. British India, ruled by the Viceroy from Delhi, stood in stark contrast to the other India, a checkerboard of hundreds of princely states, royal instruments without political power. It was in one of these states, Porbandar, that Gandhi came of age, the youngest of three sons and a daughter of the dewan (prime minister) and his fourth wife. From his father, Gandhi inherited stubbornness, incorruptibility, and great practical sense; from his mother, a life of religion, devotion, and asceticism. Shortly before his nineteenth birthday, Gandhi—by then a husband and father of several years—set sail from Bombay to England to study law; shortly thereafter, he traveled to South Africa to practice. An outsider, the young barrister tasted firsthand the bitter fruits of class prejudice, racial intolerance, and colonial oppression. At the same time, his pursuit of spiritual fulfillment and a keen curiosity about the world’s diverse religions nourished Gandhi’s own deeply felt convictions, pointing him toward the path along which he would guide India to independence. In a work of far-reaching scope and revealing intimacy, Yogesh Chadha never loses sight of the man amidst the epic swirl of history. As he explores the key events in Gandhi’s intellectual, spiritual, and political development, Chadha writes with total frankness, never shying away from the weaknesses and the more controversial aspects of both Gandhi’s public and personal lives, including struggles with sexuality and celibacy. In addition, he exposes in depth for the first time the extraordinary events surrounding Gandhi’s assassination, its planning and execution, and the subsequent trial. Here is a magnificent biography that approaches its legendary subject with honesty and admiration—and without preconceptions. Gandhi: A Life is a brilliantly constructed and inspiring work.

Rezensionen

The first major biography in over 20 years of perhaps the most remarkable, and certainly one of the strangest men ever to exercise important political influence. Born in 1869, married, as was customary at that time, at the age of 13, sent over to London to become a barrister, Gandhi found his vocation when he went to South Africa to deal with a large case, and enlisted himself in the struggle against discrimination against Asians. There he learned many of the techniques he later used against the British, including satyagraha, the Force that is born of Truth and Love or non-violence. On his return to India in 1915, he criticized the indescribable filth of the country, the conspicuous wealth of the maharajahs, and the continuing discrimination against the untouchables. His campaigns against the conditions of the Indian workers and against the hated salt tax attracted huge support, and his strategy of noncooperation with the British landed him in jail. And yet for all his efforts, his fasts unto death to reconcile Hindu and Muslim, his continuing emphasis on nonviolence, when independence came in 1947, the partition of the country was accompanied by an orgy of blood-lettingand his own assassination at the hands of a Hindu extremist. Odd as he was, a small, unimposing man with no front teeth and spindly legs, a fanatical vegetarian who ceased marital relations with his wife at 36 and who believed that sex was only permissible for procreation, and whose knowledge of events outside India was limited, by the 1930s, as Nehru put it, Gandhi was India. It is perhaps the supreme example of the power of moral force in politics, and Chadha, an Indian businessman who has spent the past eight years researching and writing this book, lets the record, so far as possible, speak for itself. It is balanced, even-handed, and, like its subject, inspiring. -- Copyright ©1998, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.