The brass notebook A memoir of freedom and feminism

Review by Booklist Review

In this straightforward, candid autobiography, Jain, a feminist economist dedicated to the Indian women's movement, recounts her remarkable life. She breaks her story into seven parts, starting with her rather unconventional upbringing in southern India and ending with reflections on losing her mother and husband to illness. Jain was allowed freedoms in her youth that weren't afforded to many of her Indian contemporaries, including her own sisters. This allowed her to put off marriage in order to pursue higher education--she moved to Oxford in her twenties and studied at Rushkin while working as a dishwasher--and also to travel: she hitchhiked from Germany to England and would eventually travel to ninety-four countries. Jain stays humble throughout her writing even though her research championing poor women in India has helped policymakers in the United Nations. She's also met a bevy of influential people who, in turn, have supported her, including Gloria Steinem, Alice Walker, Desmond Tutu, and Nelson Mandela. Jain is someone to look up to, and her memoir is perfect for larger libraries trying to expand and diversify their collections of feminist perspectives.

From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.

---

Review by Publisher's Weekly Review

Jain debuts with a stirring account of her coming-of-age in southern India and her career as a feminist economist. Jain's childhood in 1940s Mysore was shaped by her Brahmin civil servant father, who encouraged such pursuits as horseback riding, and her nurturing maternal relatives. At age 22, Jain moved to England for university studies, and later defied her father's expectations by secretly marrying an anticolonial activist from an "inconvenient" caste. By the '80s, Jain had published a study that challenged the idea that men were the main breadwinners of their households. As well, her field research about the sexual and economic exploitation of women laborers in rural India informed Women's Quest for Power: Five Indian Case Studies, a book about the collective organizations of "poor and previously disempowered women," which Jain and her coauthors presented to economists and such policymaking bodies as the United Nations. Throughout this rousing account, Jain champions a world free of "the stark inequalities of power that currently prevail" and remains humble despite her achievements ("I was never an influential academic economist"). Readers will be enlightened. (Mar.)

(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved

---

Review by Kirkus Book Review

The making of a political activist. Indian economist Jain (b. 1933) recounts her development from the "tomboy" daughter of an orthodox Brahmin family into a noted feminist. The young Devaki Sreenivasan was a child of privilege: Her father was a high-ranking civil servant whose official residences were spacious enough that his daughter could keep horses and ride. Although he encouraged her abilities, the family expected her to marry young and within their own caste. Yet she was determined to get an education first. Hoping to go to Oxford, she first attended Ruskin College, established for the working class. "Ruskin College's deep association with labour and anti-colonialism left an invisible kind of awareness in me," she writes, "first, about workers and trade unionism, and second, about imperialism and global politics." Her awareness widened, as well, from gatherings at a friend's house where she met scholars, intellectuals, journalists, and writers "discussing books and the current political scenario." She eventually attended Oxford, where her mentor in philosophy was Iris Murdoch. In 1957, she met Lakshmi Jain, a prominent activist whose family was of a lower caste--merchants and tradesmen--and who, at the time, was engaged. When her family violently opposed her marrying beneath her status, the couple wed in secret in 1966. Marriage and motherhood, however, left the author anxious, depressed, and resentful. She felt cut off from the work she yearned to do. By the late 1970s, though, with her two children in school, she was able to reimmerse herself in public life, "writing, talking and publishing about poverty and its special impact on women." Her work has taken her to 94 countries, and she has met with many African leaders, including Nelson Mandela, Julius Nyere, and Desmond Tutu. Jain has also won the admiration of influential figures such as Amartya Sen and Gloria Steinem, who each contribute an introductory piece to Jain's candid memoir. An engaging chronicle of defiance and determination. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

---