Gandhi Before India by Ramachandra Guha (PDF)

Description

Here is the first volume of a magisterial biography of Mohandas Gandhi that gives us the most illuminating portrait we have had of the life, the work and the historical context of one of the most abidingly influential—and controversial—men in modern history. Ramachandra Guha—hailed by Time as “Indian democracy’s preeminent chronicler”—takes us from Gandhi’s birth in 1869 through his upbringing in Gujarat, his two years as a student in London and his two decades as a lawyer and community organizer in South Africa. Guha has uncovered myriad previously untapped documents, including private papers of Gandhi’s contemporaries and co-workers; contemporary newspapers and court documents; the writings of Gandhi’s children; and secret files kept by British Empire functionaries. Using this wealth of material in an exuberant, brilliantly nuanced and detailed narrative, Guha describes the social, political and personal worlds inside of which Gandhi began the journey that would earn him the honorific Mahatma: “Great Soul.” And, more clearly than ever before, he elucidates how Gandhi’s work in South Africa—far from being a mere prelude to his accomplishments in India—was profoundly influential in his evolution as a family man, political thinker, social reformer and, ultimately, beloved leader. In 1893, when Gandhi set sail for South Africa, he was a twenty-three-year-old lawyer who had failed to establish himself in India. In this remarkable biography, the author makes clear the fundamental ways in which Gandhi’s ideas were shaped before his return to India in 1915. It was during his years in England and South Africa, Guha shows us, that Gandhi came to understand the nature of imperialism and racism; and in South Africa that he forged the philosophy and techniques that would undermine and eventually overthrow the British Raj. Gandhi Before India gives us equally vivid portraits of the man and the world he lived in: a world of sharp contrasts among the coastal culture of his birthplace, High Victorian London, and colonial South Africa. It explores in abundant detail Gandhi’s experiments with dissident cults such as the Tolstoyans; his friendships with radical Jews, heterodox Christians and devout Muslims; his enmities and rivalries; and his often overlooked failures as a husband and father. It tells the dramatic, profoundly moving story of how Gandhi inspired the devotion of thousands of followers in South Africa as he mobilized a cross-class and inter-religious coalition, pledged to non-violence in their battle against a brutally racist regime. Researched with unequaled depth and breadth, and written with extraordinary grace and clarity, Gandhi Before India is, on every level, fully commensurate with its subject. It will radically alter our understanding and appreciation of twentieth-century India’s greatest man.

User’s Reviews

Reviews from Amazon users which were colected at the time this book was published on the website:

⭐Given what has happened during the last few weeks in Ferguson, Missouri and Long Island, New York plus the refusal of The U.S. House of Representatives to even consider Immigration Reform Legislation proposed by our President two years ago, and the measures states like Texas have used to deprive minorities of their vote through the use of redistricting, mandatory voter ID cards, and limiting the hours when people may vote, this book is extremely timely.The book concentrates on Gandhi’s life in South Africa and his non-violent protest leadership against measures that deprived resident Indians of the right to vote, severely limited the number who were allowed to enter the country, imposed unaffordable taxes on their modest businesses, and broke up families by refusing to allow male Indian immigrants to bring their wives and children into the country with them. Does this all sound home-country familiar?You bet. If anything, I believe this book is a serious reminder to U.S. Caucasians that as a race, we are extremely slow learners when it comes to treating people of color fairly, no matter what our U.S. Constitution says. We seem to take one step forward (school integration) and then several steps back (repealing Affirmative Action). Just as it was in South Africa during the early 1900’s, the white desire to keep people of color in a subservient position where they are unlikely to flourish and are subject to great suffering seems to be based both on fear of those people in general and an unjustified sense of entitlement to a good life at the expense of others.Gandhi’s approach to achieving fair treatment of the Indians in South Africa who were supposed to be British Subjects at the time, was to stage non-violent protests which included peaceful marches, and refusals to pay selective taxes, or participate in yearly “registrations”, or observe the rule that people of color were not allowed to ride in first class on trains even if they could afford it….only third class. Rosa Parks took up this issue in the U.S. with her historic refusal to move to the back of the bus.Gandhi’s fight for equal rights extended to the Chinese as well as the Indians in South Africa. His marches and close associates also included people from many religions. Hindus like him, Tamils, Muslims, Christians and Jews all worked together for a common cause. They all marched and served the jail time that was usually imposed for the civil disobedience. Late in his South African campaign several women began to work, march and go to jail with him. This was a brave and unusual thing for women to do in the early 1900’s. Like their male participants, the women came from many different religious groups. That kind of blindness to and acceptance of differences that may exist between religious groups is sorely needed both in today’s world and our own country.Surprisingly, Gandhi seemed to ignore the largest group of color in South Africa at the time, the black South Africans. While the author mentions this, the reason is left unexplained. Perhaps he will provide one in Volume II which is to follow. Volume II will deal with Gandhi’s efforts in his native India.This is a scholarly book supported by exhaustive research of sources other than Gandhi’s records and writings. While obviously very familiar with those, Professor Guha sates that he wanted to write a book based primarily on the recollections, records or writings of others and he has successfully done so. While I am looking forward to Volume II. I consider Volume I “must reading” for anyone who cares about fair treatment for all people, regardless of color, religion, country of origin and, in today’s world, sexual orientation.

⭐What an interesting title. It’s the “before” that at once catches the eye. While India and Gandhi are inextricably linked, this book derives its principal interest from how South Africa prepared Gandhi for his future role. As Jon Stewart remarked right away when he introduced author Ramachandra Guha on his show, Gandhi is truly a “global” figure in the highest sense of the phrase even in this era of mass celebrities where he stands taller than pretty much everyone else to date. Indeed, whatever may be the future of humanity, and, however and whoever writes it, Gandhi will always be an essential player in that account. In simple, clear, enthusiastic prose Guha charts the evolution of Gandhi from a modest young lawyer with unremarkable speaking skills, one who had yet to find his real métier, to someone who became self-charged with a mission of fighting injustice in his own unique and now immediately, famously, recognizable way. In time to come, he was able to hold the attention of millions when he spoke. From what I gather reading this book, in the second half of the nineteenth century, racism in South Africa was raw and unspeakably vile. How on earth a shy young man coming from a subcontinent away, ostensibly to practice law on behalf of a small Indian community in its diaspora, stepped up to a huge challenge involving the very foundations of justice as applicable to all (if it is to be just) while still maintaining decency, dignity, kindliness vis-a-vis the aggressive Boers and British is nothing short of revolutionary – in the best sense of that word. The thing is Guha (if I understand correctly) suggests that nothing in Gandhi’s background probably predisposed him naturally to fight the battles that he met/chose. As the book points out, the “trader caste” from which Gandhi originated were just the kind of folks who abhorred rocking the boat. Profits rather than a desire for justice probably controlled their raison d’être. Guha’s challenge is to show how from such a conservative seed bed arose this innovative “warrior” of the spirit and I believe this book does that very well. One critical facet that emerges from the book is that Gandhi possessed not only an abundance of “moral”/ethical courage but, surprisingly, a great deal of “physical” courage as well despite his apparent lack of physical prowess. Thus it is that Gandhi will always stand for me as the perfect antidote to the biggest bullies of his age. In researching source materials for this book, Guha took advantage of newly arrived access to archives from post-apartheid South Africa. That was a great move on his part. I leave with the perception that the greatest of persons are not necessarily born that way. Like the rest of us they too have to swim against the current to make something of themselves. But unlike most of us, time and circumstance evoke an amazing, out of scale, and yet benevolent response from them. Read, you have nothing to lose and much to admire!

⭐A tremendous achievement. ‘Gandhi Before India’ is an extremely well-written examination of Gandhi’s years in South Africa. This period of the Mahatma’s career is often treated by Gandhi scholars and biographers as a prelude to his more productive and path-breaking years in India. Guha exposes the folly of this approach- he argues persuasively that Gandhi’s experiences in South Africa are of tremendous salience since they moulded his life and character in ways that ultimately enabled the Mahatma within him to emerge. South Africa, was in many respects, the first laboratory of Gandhi’s Satyagraha experiment, and so his time there merits close examination and study- this wonderful biography contributes enormously to the ever-growing body of Gandhi scholarship and helps to illuminate Gandhi’s formative years in South Africa.

⭐I bought this with the impression Gandhi being a good man would hold my attention. His attitude to life is very clear and honest and I take my hat off to him but the book keeps repeating its self, fighting for equality and printing his paper, this seems to go on and on through the book to the point I only managed to got 1/2 through it and called it quits. I`m not downing this book but not for me.

⭐There can be nothing short of a 5 star rating for this book. A comprehensive book on the life and works of Gandhiji in his formative years of London & South Africa.This is a must read book, especially in this time as our political spectrum is leaving no stone unturned to malign the image of Gandhi and his idealism in our country. Plus, our historical teachings doesn’t really tell us about Gandhiji’s work in South Africa. So this book is a revelation. There are so many false and degrading information going on the social media regarding his personal life. To all those, the author has clarified and claimed, satisfactorily to me atleast, all the truths behind those.

⭐It humanises the Mahatma and dwells upon what is mostly ignored by other books. Though could have been edited by about 10%.

⭐This wonderful book, written by “Gandhi’s finest biographer”, is, in a word, unputdownable. It has that pace and energy of a thriller, and why not, it charts the growth of the man who changed not only the face of India, but the whole world, a man of whom Einstein said “Generations to come, it may be, will scarce believe that such a one as this ever in flesh & blood walked upon this earth.”However, this book isn’t an out and out eulogy of Gandhi, as it is fully aware of the more humane aspects of his character. It is unbiased and hence worthy of reading and rereading.As for the quality of the book all I can say it is a Penguin paperback, so no issues with quality.

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