The Lost Homestead: My Mother, Partition and the Punjab (Paperback)
Marina Wheeler (author)Published: 15/07/2021
In this gripping and eye-opening memoir, Marina Wheeler tells the story of her mother’s early years shaped by the Partition and her subsequent search for personal and political freedom.
On 3 June 1947, as British India descended into chaos, its division into two states was announced. For months the violence and civil unrest escalated. With millions of others, Marina Wheeler's mother Dip Singh and her Sikh family were forced to flee their home in the Punjab, never to return.
As an Anglo-Indian with roots in what is now Pakistan, Marina Wheeler weave's her mother's story of loss and new beginnings, personal and political freedom into the broader, still highly contested, history of the region. We follow Dip when she marries Marina's English father and leaves India for good, to Berlin, then a divided city, and to Washington DC where the fight for civil rights embraced the ideals of Mahatma Gandhi.
The Lost Homestead touches on global themes that strongly resonate today: political change, religious extremism, migration, minorities, nationhood, identity and belonging. But above all it is about coming to terms with the past, and about the stories we choose to tell about ourselves.
Publisher: Hodder & Stoughton
ISBN: 9781473677760
Number of pages: 336
Weight: 260 g
Dimensions: 196 x 128 x 26 mm
MEDIA REVIEWS
'A personal, sometimes harrowing history of partition... a writer well worth reading.' - The Times
A deeply personal story of identity and a highly relatable journey for many in the diaspora... Wheeler taps a rich vein of personal history... Evocative... Gripping. - Financial Times
In spare, occasionally lyrical prose, The Lost Homestead meticulously tells the story of her much-loved Sikh-born mother. - Sonia Purnell, Evening Standard
Her poignant memoir reminds us that our past shares no borders with our present. - F.S. Aijazuddin, Dawn
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