Gandhi : An AutoBiography
Gandhi's nonviolent struggles in South Africa and India had alreadybrought him to such a level of notoriety, adulation, and controversythat when asked to write an autobiography midway through his career, hetook it as an opportunity to explain himself. Although accepting of hisstatus as a great innovator in the struggle against racism, violence,and, just then, colonialism, Gandhi feared that enthusiasm for hisideas tended to exceed a deeper understanding. He says that he wasafter truth rooted in devotion to God and attributed the turningpoints, successes, and challenges in his life to the will of God. Hisattempts to get closer to this divine power led him to seek puritythrough simple living, dietary practices (he called himself afruitarian), celibacy, and ahimsa, a life without violence. It is in this sense that he calls his book The Story of My Experiments with Truth,offering it also as a reference for those who would follow in hisfootsteps. A reader expecting a complete accounting of his actions,however, will be sorely disappointed. Although Gandhi presents hisepisodes chronologically, he happily leaves wide gaps, such as theentire satyagraha struggle in South Africa, for which he refers the reader to another of his books. And writing for his contemporaries, he takes it for granted that the reader is familiarwith the major events of his life and of the political milieu of early20th-century India. For the objective story, try Yogesh Chadha's Gandhi: A Life.For the inner world of a man held as a criminal by the British, a heroby Muslims, and a holy man by Hindus, look no further than theseexperiments.
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[code]http://rapidshare.com/files/52368697/Gandhi_An_Autobiography__The_Story_of_My_Experiments_With_Truth.pdf[/code]
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