India - by Robert McGahey (Paperback)
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<p/><br></br><p><b> About the Book </b></p></br></br><p>The memoir records the complex relationship of two Americans, drawn deeply by Vedanta into a marriage of East and West on many levels. It opens a wide window on the cross-cultural affair between American counterculture and Hindu South Asia.</p><p/><br></br><p><b> Book Synopsis </b></p></br></br><p> I'm riding a late-night taxi through the streets of Bombay, sidewalks littered with hundreds of bodies, all the way to the curb. This must be some kind of plague, but nobody told me. Deep down, I'm possessed, despite my fear. So begins my love story with India.</p><p> This narrative records the complex, sometimes funny, sometimes agonizing relationship of two Americans, each drawn deeply by Vedanta into a marriage of East and West on many levels. Their love affair and marriage, in which a passion for India is the driver and fulcrum, opens a wide window on American life, culture, and counterculture, beginning in the late Sixties and extending into the millennium.</p><p>In Part One, during a Fulbright year based in Malwa studying khyal with the master Kumar Gandharva, I enter an underworld reflection of life in America, immersed in India's smells and sights as well as the inexhaustible sound-world of North Indian vocal music. My newly awakened sexuality is swallowed by the mythic substratum of Hindu goddess figures during a period of instinctive celibacy. Intrigued by an invitation from Maurice Frydman to "join the fellowship of the undeceived," I begin a lifelong effort to practice Advaita through self-inquiry as taught by Ramana Maharshi.</p><p>"I expect to reach enlightenment in this lifetime." She tells me this the week I meet her. In part two, I return to India with my wife Judi, a medical doctor and yoga teacher who is skeptical, reluctant to share the India experience with me. But as we hop between ashrams, she, too, falls in love with India. In the end, we are banished by the head swami, who tells us to go home, have children, fulfill our work, and serve our parents. We can return after we complete our householder duties. </p><p>When we return to India in the Nineties, the tables have turned. I, once totally smitten, am dismayed by modern India, whereas Judi is ever more deeply enthralled, throwing herself into Sanskrit and taking a teacher, who names her Geeta Jyothi. As our sons leave the house, she begins long winter ashram sojourns, contemplating vows of monkhood which threaten our marriage.</p><p>This memoir has the potential to interest a wide audience of seekers: those who throng the "spirituality" section in the West - especially "India freaks," their children, and the burgeoning readership of South Asian writers, particularly middle-class Indians who remember the curious phenomenon of the "Amreekan hippy-saddhu." I believe it will appeal to the followers of Ram Das, Ramana Maharshi, Swamis Chidananda and Krishnananda (Sivananda Ashram), and Vinoba Bhave-characters all-but especially of Kumar Gandharva and Sunderlal Bahuguna (Chipko), remarkable figures with whom our lives become intertwined.</p><p/><br></br><p><b> Review Quotes </b></p></br></br><br><p>India has a way of getting under one's skin, and for some of us, for mysterious karmic reasons, it goes straight to the soul and stays there, utterly transforming one's life. Robert McGahey is one so blessed, and the tale he elegantly weaves is one of repeated transformation through pleasure and pain, losses and gains, and lessons learned in both hard ways and happy ways. All readers stand to benefit enormously from those life lessons; the author's insights are personal, and also perennial. And old India hands and armchair travelers alike will be enthralled by his adventures, observations, and discoveries. I've been to India many times, and will see it anew the next time I go, thanks to this book. - Philip Goldberg, author of American Veda</em> and The Life of Yogananda</em></p><p>"Robert McGahey's India: A Love Story is three things in one: an exhaustive spiritual autobiography, a compelling Asian travel narrative, and the epic saga of a difficult marriage between two pilgrims in love with India and each other. McGahey is a worthy guide. Adeptly limning Hindu mythology, Jungian archetypes, and India's kaleidoscopic hyperrealism, his long journey in search of "the fellowship of the undeceived" is itself, in its way, an archetypal Boomer pilgrimage, literary kin to Bob Dylan's musical trifecta, "Isis," "Idiot Wind," and "Sara," in which a "mystical wife" serves as lodestar, symbol and finally a version of Plato's cave. Good stuff." - Alan Davis, author of <em>So Bravely Vegetative</em> and co-editor of <em>Visiting Bob: Poems Inspired by the Life and Work of Bob Dylan</em></p><p>"A Love Story" is a perfect subtitle for Robert McGahey's wonderful book on his life in India. As a reader you are taken deep into the unique mixture of sensuality and spirituality that makes this mystic land so culturally rich. You follow the adventures of an eternally young man through relationships, learnings and embarrassments. Down in the thick sediment of it all you glimpse profound revelations about the meaning of life. And all of this is served with beautiful, mature prose." -Thomas Moore, author of Care of the Soul</em> and Soul Mates</em></p><p>"India: A Love Story</em> is an arresting and heart-warming autobiographical story. From Harvard to Bombay to the mountains of rural North Carolina, McGahey takes us through the steps of his dance of love." -Thomas Rain Crowe, author of Zorro's Field</em></p><p>"[McGahey] is a skillful writer, and this travelogue and soul-searching confessional features prose that is evocative and even entrancing." -Kirkus Reviews</em> </p><p>If this eloquent memoir focused solely on the mysticism and music, on the natural beauty of vast sweeps of the country, the ashrams where they stayed ranging from sparse to enchanting, this story would hold the reader. But over and again, the author's wicked sense of humor bubbles up as he relishes his experiences from youth to late middle-age. Laugh out loud passages delight as he recognizes eccentricities enmeshed in spellbinding surroundings. -Jane Manaster, San Franciso Book Review</p><p><br></p><p> </p><p><br></p><p> </p><p><br></p><br>
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