What do you think?
Rate this book
The Weave of My Life: A Dalit Woman's Memoirs
"My mother used to weave aaydans , the Marathi generic term for all things made from bamboo. I find that her act of weaving and my act of writing are organically linked. The weave is similar. It is the weave of pain, suffering, and agony that links us."
Activist and award-winning writer Urmila Pawar recounts three generations of Dalit women who struggled to overcome the burden of their caste. Dalits, or untouchables, make up India's poorest class. Forbidden from performing anything but the most undesirable and unsanitary duties, for years Dalits were believed to be racially inferior and polluted by nature and were therefore forced to live in isolated communities.
Pawar grew up on the rugged Konkan coast, near Mumbai, where the Mahar Dalits were housed in the center of the village so the upper castes could summon them at any time. As Pawar writes, "the community grew up with a sense of perpetual insecurity, fearing that they could be attacked from all four sides in times of conflict. That is why there has always been a tendency in our people to shrink within ourselves like a tortoise and proceed at a snail's pace." Pawar eventually left Konkan for Mumbai, where she fought for Dalit rights and became a major figure in the Dalit literary movement. Though she writes in Marathi, she has found fame in all of India.
In this frank and intimate memoir, Pawar not only shares her tireless effort to surmount hideous personal tragedy but also conveys the excitement of an awakening consciousness during a time of profound political and social change.
Activist and award-winning writer Urmila Pawar recounts three generations of Dalit women who struggled to overcome the burden of their caste. Dalits, or untouchables, make up India's poorest class. Forbidden from performing anything but the most undesirable and unsanitary duties, for years Dalits were believed to be racially inferior and polluted by nature and were therefore forced to live in isolated communities.
Pawar grew up on the rugged Konkan coast, near Mumbai, where the Mahar Dalits were housed in the center of the village so the upper castes could summon them at any time. As Pawar writes, "the community grew up with a sense of perpetual insecurity, fearing that they could be attacked from all four sides in times of conflict. That is why there has always been a tendency in our people to shrink within ourselves like a tortoise and proceed at a snail's pace." Pawar eventually left Konkan for Mumbai, where she fought for Dalit rights and became a major figure in the Dalit literary movement. Though she writes in Marathi, she has found fame in all of India.
In this frank and intimate memoir, Pawar not only shares her tireless effort to surmount hideous personal tragedy but also conveys the excitement of an awakening consciousness during a time of profound political and social change.
320 pages, Hardcover
First published October 1, 2007
16 people are currently reading
986 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 15 of 15 reviews
September 14, 2009
The Weave of My Life is the memoir of an "untouchable" caste woman in India. She is an excellent storyteller, skillfully bringing her stories alive in my imagination.
She gives details of what daily village life was like in the time of her grandmother, mother, and in her childhood. She also talks about how things have changed for the Dalits during her lifetime. She gives some information about Hinduism and Buddhism and the political movements that helped change life for the Dalits, but generally only as it directly impacted her life. The first half of the book is full of general stories about her relatives and her childhood and gives the reader a look into their culture. The second half focuses more on specifics of her life story (including life in a city and dealing with the changing times in regards to the untouchable castes). I found it all very interesting.
Most of the bad language in the book was indicated using the "he cursed" style. A minor amount was spelled out, mostly when she was relating specific dialogue she had overheard.
Overall, I'd highly recommend this fascinating memoir to anyone interested in what life was like for the untouchable castes in India and how things are changing for them.
She gives details of what daily village life was like in the time of her grandmother, mother, and in her childhood. She also talks about how things have changed for the Dalits during her lifetime. She gives some information about Hinduism and Buddhism and the political movements that helped change life for the Dalits, but generally only as it directly impacted her life. The first half of the book is full of general stories about her relatives and her childhood and gives the reader a look into their culture. The second half focuses more on specifics of her life story (including life in a city and dealing with the changing times in regards to the untouchable castes). I found it all very interesting.
Most of the bad language in the book was indicated using the "he cursed" style. A minor amount was spelled out, mostly when she was relating specific dialogue she had overheard.
Overall, I'd highly recommend this fascinating memoir to anyone interested in what life was like for the untouchable castes in India and how things are changing for them.
August 7, 2020
Engaging, entertaining and brutally honest, this book is one of the highlights of my summer reading schedule. What an astounding writer.
April 19, 2012
This is a wonderful peace of testimonio writing, or roman a clef. It ties nicely with Appiah piece on cosmopolitan reading, by telling detailed and concrete stories, testimonio writing allows readers to conjure up a world that allows them to empathize with the kind of life depicted while still keeping a critical distance--we are similar but NOT the same.
June 23, 2020
I just finished reading this book and I don't even think I will do justice in telling you how much I loved and enjoyed this book. This beaut was funny and heartbreaking and nostalgic and interesting and inspiring and everything. Everything. This book was everything. It's a memoir of the writer's life as a Dalit woman. It literally felt as if I am sitting in the writer's house, sipping a cup of tea, and the writer is sitting on a comfy armchair and telling me her stories about her life with a smile on her face (and sometimes tears in her eyes) — stories of her childhood life, of her teenage life, life as a married woman, life as a mother, as an activist, as a writer, as a feminist, life as a Dalit woman. And I am listening to everything she is saying with my mouth open — with so much of interest that I forget about the existence of a human construct called time. I was so much engrossed while reading this beaut. I fell in love with this awesome woman. Urmila Pawar — the writer of the book — compares her writing as an activity similar to her mother's of weaving an Aaydan (a wooden basket) of which an important raw-material is pain (The Marathi title of her book is Aaydan. This is an English-translated book.). We all need something to pour our pain into. And this weaving of the writer was SO inspiring — beautiful, wonderful and inspiring. The weaving of this beaut was from her heart. This beaut was her whole heart and pain and love and soul and life. 💛
Read
May 7, 2021This memoir was written in Marathi and translated to English. It is about the life of a Dalit girl whose family got converted after being inspired by Ambedkar's ideology while she was still in school. This girl is emphasized as being quite outspoken and outgoing in spite of her caste. As a result, the issues she faced with respect to her caste are underwhelming. This could have also been the effect of the translation not being able to retain the emotion of the original content. The author does manage to highlight some of the grave issues her community faced and/or faces even today.
As a young girl, adolescent, as then a married woman, the author and her husband both are shown to have had a progressive way of thinking, which seems quite in contrast to some of the events mentioned. Also, the book doesn't cover all the aspects of her life, which the author mentions was left out due to a couple of reasons. As a result, the reader is left with a book that is incomplete and evidently so.
As a young girl, adolescent, as then a married woman, the author and her husband both are shown to have had a progressive way of thinking, which seems quite in contrast to some of the events mentioned. Also, the book doesn't cover all the aspects of her life, which the author mentions was left out due to a couple of reasons. As a result, the reader is left with a book that is incomplete and evidently so.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
Read
May 1, 2020Moving story of a Dalit woman. You have to be born as a Dalit to understand the pain, hardships, humiliation, discrimination and gender discrimination in the community, they go through each day. I had tears in my eyes.
November 7, 2021
An honest account of a Dalit woman's life as she saw her mother struggling, struggled herself to make sense of a casteist and patriarchal society. She writes honestly about how she found strength in her pursuit of knowledge and fighting the roles she was expected to perform. Beautifully written. Reminder to all of us caste individuals about the kind of atrocities that Dalits face because of our and our family's inherent casteism!
September 21, 2017
Loved every part of this book. A beautifully woven set of memories and experiences from the life of a female Dalit activist and award-winning writer. Urmila Pawar doesn't hold back when it comes to writing her experiences about patriarchy and caste, and how she grappled with them throughout her life. This book is one of those that I'll be going back to every now and then!
February 27, 2021
While the book is absolutely phenomenal, one of the things that it spoke about was the exclusion of dalit women from the mainstream feminist movements. It's a sad fact that remains true even today.
Like many other books in dalit literature, especially those written by women authors, it talks about the intersection of caste and patriarchy & how they work together to further oppress women.
Like many other books in dalit literature, especially those written by women authors, it talks about the intersection of caste and patriarchy & how they work together to further oppress women.
September 7, 2022
खूप सुंदर, नक्की वाचायला हवं सगळ्यांनी.
November 7, 2023
Powerful.
August 29, 2024
Very beautifully written, a poignant reminder of yesteryears..
December 14, 2009
At the end of her memoir, The Weave of My Life, Urmila Pawar writes, “Life has taught me many things, showed me so much, it has also lashed out at me till I bled. I don’t know how much longer I am going to live, nor do I know in what form life is going to confront me. Let it come in any form; I am ready to face it stoically. This is what my life has taught me. This is my life and that is me!”
People write memoirs for different reasons. Some write memoirs because they’re paid a lot of money to give their version of important eras or events in which they were a pivotal player. Some want to even the score, set the record straight, or tell their story so others might learn from their experiences. I suspect that Pawar’s reason for writing The Weave of My Life was the last one.
Pawar is a well-known activist and award winning writer in India who continues to advocate for greater rights for Dalits (formerly called untouchables) and women in a country with complex social mores rooted in ancient traditions and religious teachings. Pawar tells of growing up as a Dalit on the Kolkan coast near Mumbai in the ‘50s and ‘60s when charismatic leaders like Dr. Ambedkar were advocating for a new casteless society where, if you were born into a lower caste, you were not born into your destiny with no hope of ever rising above your circumstances.
She writes about her experiences with caste discrimination in a matter-of-fact manner devoid of self-pity. As she recounts in her memoir, “the community grew up with a perpetual sense of insecurity, fearing that they could be attacked from all four sides in times of conflict. That is why there has always been a tendency in our people to shrink within ourselves like a tortoise and proceed at a snail’s pace.” Pawar says this slow pace picked up radically after her community’s mass spontaneous conversion to Buddhism in the wake of Dr. Ambedkar’s death because Buddhism allowed them to view themselves and their place in the world in a new way.
The book traces Pawar’s life from a very young age in a village where men and women lived a life of hard work and drudgery. Pawar’s family was somewhat unique for a Dalit family. Her father performed priestly duties for their caste, which were typically performed by Brahmins. Both of her parents were also strong believers in the importance of education to propel their children into a better life. Pawar’s resilience and strong belief in herself and her abilities shines through in this candid and inspiring memoir. From a young age, Pawar enjoyed acting in plays and participating in every aspect of school activities.
Pawar goes against her family’s wishes and marries a man whose family is somewhat below hers in social stature and who is less educated than her. It becomes clear early on that there will be tension in marriage because Pawar is a force of nature whose intensity only strengthens as she comes into her own. After the family moves to Mumbai, Pawar becomes involved in the Dalit rights movement and is recognized as a leading light in the Dalit literary movement. She writes frankly about her husband’s constant criticism and emotional abuse as she continued to do her “social work” and her writing and gained acclaim in the form of awards and published works. She also describes the fissures in the Dalit rights movement between human rights and women’s rights, which were not considered as important by the male leaders and often fell by the wayside.
By the end of the memoir, Pawar has experienced much loss and tragedy. She loses her son, her mother, and her husband in a relatively short period of time and finds herself being blamed by some in her community for these misfortunes because she was not a more traditional wife and mother.
At times I found it hard to keep track of the numerous family members, acquaintances and fellow activists Pawar mentions in the book. I also found myself constantly checking the glossary to remind myself of the meanings of various Marathi words used throughout the text. That aside, what I especially like about this memoir is that Pawar doesn’t whitewash, or sugar-coat the difficulties she encountered both personally and professionally. Her honesty in presenting her life and the daily struggles and victories she experienced is inspiring and is a testament to her courage and strength of character.
Review by Gita Tewari
People write memoirs for different reasons. Some write memoirs because they’re paid a lot of money to give their version of important eras or events in which they were a pivotal player. Some want to even the score, set the record straight, or tell their story so others might learn from their experiences. I suspect that Pawar’s reason for writing The Weave of My Life was the last one.
Pawar is a well-known activist and award winning writer in India who continues to advocate for greater rights for Dalits (formerly called untouchables) and women in a country with complex social mores rooted in ancient traditions and religious teachings. Pawar tells of growing up as a Dalit on the Kolkan coast near Mumbai in the ‘50s and ‘60s when charismatic leaders like Dr. Ambedkar were advocating for a new casteless society where, if you were born into a lower caste, you were not born into your destiny with no hope of ever rising above your circumstances.
She writes about her experiences with caste discrimination in a matter-of-fact manner devoid of self-pity. As she recounts in her memoir, “the community grew up with a perpetual sense of insecurity, fearing that they could be attacked from all four sides in times of conflict. That is why there has always been a tendency in our people to shrink within ourselves like a tortoise and proceed at a snail’s pace.” Pawar says this slow pace picked up radically after her community’s mass spontaneous conversion to Buddhism in the wake of Dr. Ambedkar’s death because Buddhism allowed them to view themselves and their place in the world in a new way.
The book traces Pawar’s life from a very young age in a village where men and women lived a life of hard work and drudgery. Pawar’s family was somewhat unique for a Dalit family. Her father performed priestly duties for their caste, which were typically performed by Brahmins. Both of her parents were also strong believers in the importance of education to propel their children into a better life. Pawar’s resilience and strong belief in herself and her abilities shines through in this candid and inspiring memoir. From a young age, Pawar enjoyed acting in plays and participating in every aspect of school activities.
Pawar goes against her family’s wishes and marries a man whose family is somewhat below hers in social stature and who is less educated than her. It becomes clear early on that there will be tension in marriage because Pawar is a force of nature whose intensity only strengthens as she comes into her own. After the family moves to Mumbai, Pawar becomes involved in the Dalit rights movement and is recognized as a leading light in the Dalit literary movement. She writes frankly about her husband’s constant criticism and emotional abuse as she continued to do her “social work” and her writing and gained acclaim in the form of awards and published works. She also describes the fissures in the Dalit rights movement between human rights and women’s rights, which were not considered as important by the male leaders and often fell by the wayside.
By the end of the memoir, Pawar has experienced much loss and tragedy. She loses her son, her mother, and her husband in a relatively short period of time and finds herself being blamed by some in her community for these misfortunes because she was not a more traditional wife and mother.
At times I found it hard to keep track of the numerous family members, acquaintances and fellow activists Pawar mentions in the book. I also found myself constantly checking the glossary to remind myself of the meanings of various Marathi words used throughout the text. That aside, what I especially like about this memoir is that Pawar doesn’t whitewash, or sugar-coat the difficulties she encountered both personally and professionally. Her honesty in presenting her life and the daily struggles and victories she experienced is inspiring and is a testament to her courage and strength of character.
Review by Gita Tewari
Read
October 21, 2009Pawar, born into a family of “untouchables,” tells of three generations of women driven even deeper into invisibility by the patriarchy of their Dalit caste.
Read
September 18, 2013the moving saga of a socially deprived woman who fights all odds in life
Displaying 1 - 15 of 15 reviews