This groundbreaking volume offers a selection of writing in ten languages which have never before been available either as a collection or in English. Providing an extraordinary body of literature and an important documentary resource, these writings illuminate the lives of Indian women over a period of great social and political change. The ciritical introductions and biographical headnotes map women's shifting roles and varying responses to the social, political, and cultural.

'….as engrossing and intellectually stimulating a piece of argument as anyone has read, its strong beam illuminating the texts that follow.'

'… the introductory essays and headnotes are themselves stellar pieces.'

'The selection also demonstrate the need to question one's assumptions about what is literature and what is great literature.'-Studies in History.

'…asks for a revaluation of how history is recorded… and of whose stories may be told.'

'A book that is revolutionary.. Which it will be impossible ever again to ignore.'

'…Remarkable for [its] extensive research…the sensitive and rigorous…translations of each piece, and the impressive introductions to each section….'