Herman's Gandhi and Churchill is an uneven effort to parallel the lives of the Indian independence leader and British Prime Minister.
Dual biographies tend to be awkward frameworks for analysis, especially since Gandhi and Churchill only met once in passing this approach often tends to reduce subjects to symbols of their respective causes.
Such is the case here, To his credit, Herman is an engaging and fluent writer who does an admirable job making the complex whirl of British politics, Indian activism, military conflicts and protests cohesive and digestible even to lay readers.
It's the biography aspect that lets the book down, Herman takes a debunking tone towards Gandhi, stressing his political shrewdness or opportunism, his human failures including racial prejudice towards Africans and feuds with fellow nationalists like Nehru, Jinnah and Bose over his saintly qualities.
This would be fair enough since Herman balances this critique with recognition of the Mahatma's courage and principles, except he scarcely seems able to say a bad word about Churchill.
Sure, there's a word here and there about Churchill's racial views, his resistance to Home Rule and a brief passage on his callous response to the Bengal Famine of, but it's mostly the Bulldog Winston gallantly holding the line against fascism and chaos, against the "halfnaked fakir" whose unyielding principles repeatedly sabotage earnest British efforts at negotiating selfgovernment.
Perhaps this is inevitable from a Western historian Churchill's sainted reputation has died hard in the US and UK, his battle against Hitler overshadowing the rest of his long, oftcheckered career.
But it still results in a book that, though readable and wellorganized, seems reluctant to face at least one of its subjects headon the result being a skewed, unreliable portrait.
The narration by Mr. Herman is amazing. While reading, it provides you the intense work done by him to know history, He took aroundyears to write this, and am happy that i could read it, The best part is that this book is not biased, he tried to put the facts letting the readers to judge, Gandhi And Churchill : The Two Great Personalities Of Theth CE
“A leader is one who knows the way, goes the way, and shows the way.
”
John C. Maxwell
Gandhi and Churchill, The epic rivalry that destroyed an empire and forged our age is quite a good book on the two greatest personalities of theth CE.
But before we start discussing about this book, I wanna tell one thing for sure that this book is not everyone's cup of tea, and if you haven't read the Indian freedom movement carefully and diligently, and about the life and times of Gandhiji, then it would be advisable for you to read about it first, then you can go for this book.
So, let's start by asking some questions,
Who was Mahatma Gandhi Who was Winston Churchill Why they were considered as the greatest personalities of theth CE What kind of relationship existed between these two men And most importantly what we can learn from them
Mohandas Karmchand Gandhi aka Mahatma Gandhi was one of the most important Indian freedom fighter who fought against the British imperialism.
He gave the world a peaceful method of resistance i, e. Satyagraha, or Truth Force. And because of his principle of nonviolence he is still revered throughout the world,
Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill was the former Prime Minister of Britain, He was the man who successfully led his country against the Nazism of Hitler, Throughout his life he remained a diehard imperialist, And the baiter of the Indian national Congress, and the one man whom he hated the most was, Mahatma Gandhi,
Mahatma Gandhi and Winston Churchill were considered as the greatest personalities of theth CE because of various reasons,
Gandhiji was considered as the greatest because of his staunch believe in the concept of ahimsa, or nonviolence, Throughout his life no matter what the circumstances were but he never stayed an inch away from his principle of nonviolence, That's why people like Martin Luther King Jr, Nelson Mandela considered Gandhiji as their ideal,
Winston Churchill was considered as the greatest because during the WWthis man showed the tremendous courage and strength, and defeated the Nazi Germany.
And because of his leadership Britain won the World war second,
The relationship between these two men were normal, They both tried to maneuver each other throughout their life time,
We can learn lots of things from these two men, the first and foremost is the unparalleled love which they showed for their respective nations.
Secondly, their great willpower. And the ability to lead their countries during the time of crisis,
I will end with these lines of Ray Kroc :
"The quality of a leader is reflected in the standards they set for themselves".
My Ratings :/
I hope you like
this, Thanks for reading, Jai Hind, i loved this book, very revealing portrait of political turmoil throught the first half of theth century,
and also great notes on the two individuals who along with Hitler, Stalin and Roosevelt, helped shape our world during that time.
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many surprising notes about G and C and their personalities and beliefs, from reliable sources, . .
Herman's portrayal of WC is really not that flattering, but I think realistic, the man had his faults, like us all, but was able to rise,
and be remembered as 'great'.
. British/Indian relations were very complicated, . This is yet another one of those books about to historic figures who might be part of the same story but spent hardly any time looking each other in the eye.
In the case of Gandhi and Churchill they met in person wants in aboutwhen Gandhi was a young attorney dressed up like an English man coming to London from South Africa to write the wrongs of those times.
The young guy and he was a racist, His problems in South Africa arose because he was annoyed to be treated like black people, He believed in the color line between white and black and he simply wanted to be treated as a person on the white side of the line.
Eventually he came to a place where he was trying to improve the lives of the untouchables in India, But he was definitely a pretty complicated guy,
I definitely learned some things about both Gandhi and Churchill that I hadnt known before, Churchill was definitely an imperialist, He definitely thought Britain was making life better for many of the people in their colonies who were not competent to manage their own countries.
Gandhi definitely thought the British were bad guys, The book examines both of them as people coming from the Victorian era, Both had problems living their lives in the post Victorian age,
As often happens with this kind of book, there is a lot of individual history for our two main characters that is independent of each other.
And there are plenty of occasions where the author seems to be stretching it a bit to suggest some human similarities between the two.
Great exercise in demythologizing, especially of Gandhi
It has been said of French president Clemenceau that he had one illusion, France, and one disillusion, mankind, including Frenchmen.
Arthur Herman, in his magisterial new dual biography, shows how the same could be said of his twin protagonists over India and Indians.
Churchill's illusion was that Britain could continue to hold on to the old British Raj, even after World War II and a bankrupt British treasury.
His disillusion was rather a cynicism about Indian capacity for selfgovernment, lumping Gandhi in with millions of other religious fakirs,
Gandhi's illusion was multiple, but basically of two parts, The second was that a medievalage India, withmillion people all picking up Gandhi's spinning wheel, was possible, was the best way for India to go, and was desired by most Indians.
His second, more tragic illusion was that India without MuslimHindu partition was the only way to go, and that it could only be done on his terms.
Herman documents how Gandhi, not Churchill, not Viceroy Archibald Wavell, not Muhammad Ali Jinnah or anybody else, wrecked the last reasonable shot at an unpartioned India because it wasn't done his way.
Gandhi's illusion That Indians wanted to follow his way of satyagraha, or "soul force," in its nonviolence, as well as to become peasantbased, rather than Nehru's vision of technologydriven socialism.
Herman shows that British actions in Gandhi's years of the Raj were NOT driven by nonviolence but rather, the fear of violence that accompanied most of Gandhi's arrests, fasts from prison, etc.
In short, Gandhi comes off badly in this book, and deservedly so,
The mythical Gandhi of Ben Kingsley's acting and of previous bios of the Mahatma is just that a myth, Herman rightfully shows that Gandhi impeded India's independence at the times he wasn't irrelevant,
Churchill, meanwhile, was Gandhi's tar baby, Hiss "years in the wilderness" were all due to India, ultimately, His irrationality on the subject had some influence on some of his wilder military tactics proposals during World War II, as well,
But Herman doesn't stop there, He gets deeper into the personages of both, what drove them, and how neither could understand the other's drives, Churchill, who was a secularist his adult life, could never understand, let alone accept, Gandhi's religious revitalization, Gandhi, meanwhile, could understand Churchill more but would never lower himself from his hyperidealist pinnacle enough to translate that into action,
If not for these two, India would have been independent earlier, and likely would have remained in the British Commonwealth,
An excellent book, And one of which this long review only scratches the surface,
And Herman, who helped his dad with galley proofs of a new translation of the BhagavadGita when he was a child, has the academic and personal background to make this book excellent.
Gandhi and Churchill were among the most influential men of theth century, born within five years of each othermiles apart, Though they met only once, their lives, values and goals would clash headon several times, Arthur Herman writes a very readable book which includes not only the lives of these two Titans but incorporates also the history of the world during their lives the two World Wars, the Depression and of course the fight for Indias independence.
The book clearly reveals what a challenge the struggle for independence in India was with Indias varying groups unable to compromise the Hindu majority, the Muslim minority, the Untouchables.
Then again there are differences in how groups think this Independence is to be achieved, Gandhi espouses his non violent satyagraha movement, others like SC Bose think only a military solution will work and still others want to drive the British out using terrorist activities.
How are these varying groups to come together and make one nation out of Indias teeming population ofmillion people
The author lays the blame for the violence and chaos of the movement at the door of the following first of all the British Government which by delaying independence by more thanyears allows hostilities between Hindus and Muslims to fester till they reach explosive levels then leaders like Nehru and Jinnah whose personal ambitions are ahead of national unity then Churchill who as Prime Minister refuses to accept that Indias independence is a foregone conclusion and cannot let go his dream of British Imperialism and finally Gandhi who for the sake of an “ unrealizable ideal” may have stood in the way of decisions which though not perfect would have prevented the violence.
This is the authors view I can see many readers, Indians especially disagreeing with some or all of the arguments,
The last chapter of the book detailing how similar Churchill and Gandhis lives were is excellent, Both were men who at a very early age knew what they wanted, Churchill wanted to reestablish Britains old grandeur of Imperialism, Gandhi wanted India not only to be free but wanted India to be the shining example of a society based on Love, Cooperation and Unity.
Their ways to achieve these goals were different one was a man of war another an apostle of peace, But they were both equally passionate about their goals and singleminded in its achievement, Both were men who wanted to lead their people towards these goals, Both faced great success and crushing failure, Both enjoyed ardent adulation as well as extreme dislike, Both had their share of family problems with their children but both had very loving relationships with their wives, Churchill won the war for Britain but did not convince his people that British Imperialism was still possible and that it was good for Britain and those over whom they ruled.
Gandhi got Indian Independence but could not convince his Hindu and Muslim countrymen to live with each other in peace, The world sees both of them as great achievers but I am not sure they thought of themselves that way at the end of their lives.
The book is large atpages but at several points it is a page turner, It has a number of interesting details and never drags, I recommend reading it.
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