Out of India

by JamilaGavin (Author)

• Used

  Hardcover
  1997

  $3.25

  In 1947 Jamila Gavin was a small child living in India in the foothills of the Himalayas. Her father was Indian and a friend of Mahatma Gandhi, and her mother was English. Her earliest memories are of travelling by sea between India and England on a huge ocean liner. Because she is half Indian and half English she has become used to describing herself as half and half. Out of India tells the story of the young Jamila: her memories of growing up in a beautiful Indian palace, the daring games played with her brother, and her family's move to London where her new school friends have endless questions about her old life. The young Jamila experiences the last days of Colonial India and the excitement of Independence. In this autobiographical account, published to mark fifty years of Indian Independence, she relives the experiences of her early years and her memories of those heady days of hope in a new future for India.

• Used

  Paperback
  2002

  $3.25

  'I am truly a child of both countries and both cultures.' Born to an Indian father and an English mother, Jamila Gavin's childhood was divided between two worlds. Her earliest memories are of India, where she lived in a crumbling palace built for a prince, and learned to steal sugar cane and suck mangoes. But she would spend much of her childhood in England, where she picked blackberries, got chilblains, and learned to recognise doodlebug bombs. And between the two there were unforgettable journeys, by bullock carts and tongas, crowded trains and romantic P&O liners. A touching and very personal recollection, with a backdrop of world-shaking events, from the Blitz of World War II to the struggle for Indian independence and the assassination of Gandhi. Illustrated with the author's own delightful photographs.