Leaving India

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Ebook in EPUB format. Available for immediate download after we receive your order

DRM:
Watermark

Publication Year:
2009

ISBN-13: 9780547345413

<DIV><B>The PEN Award&ndash;winning chronicle of the Indian diaspora told through the stories of the author&rsquo;s own family.</B><BR /><BR /> In this &ldquo;rich, entertaining and illuminating story,&rdquo; Minal Hajratwala mixes history, memoir, and reportage to explore the collisions of choice and history that led her family to emigrate from India (<I>San Francisco Chronicle</I>). &ldquo;Meticulously researched and evocatively written&rdquo; (<I>The Washington Post</I>), <I>Leaving India</I> looks for answers to the eternal questions that faced not only Hajratwala&rsquo;s own Indian family but all immigrants, everywhere: Where did we come from? Why did we leave? What did we give up and gain in the process?<BR /> &#160;<BR /> Beginning with her great-grandfather Motiram&rsquo;s original flight from British-occupied India to Fiji, where he rose from tailor to department store mogul, Hajratwala follows her ancestors across the twentieth-century to explain how they came to be spread across five continents and nine countries. As she delves into the relationship between personal choice and the great historical forces&mdash;British colonialism, apartheid, Gandhi&rsquo;s salt march, and American immigration policy&mdash;that helped shape her family&rsquo;s experiences, Hajratwala brings to light for the very first time the story of the Indian diaspora.<BR /> &#160;<BR /> A luminous narrative from &ldquo;a fine daughter of the continent, bringing insight, intelligence and compassion to the lives and sojourns of her far-flung kin,&rdquo; <I>Leaving India</I> offers a deeply intimate look at what it means to call more than one part of the world home (Alice Walker).</DIV>