Dora Scarlett's life spanned the 20th century and was influenced by its great social movements. "A drop-out before the term was invented", she ran a smallholding in wartime Devon, became a Communist Party activist, traveled widely behind the Iron Curtain, and worked as a broadcaster at Radio Budapest. Her first-hand experience of the savage Soviet repression of the 1956 Hungarian Uprising destroyed her faith in Communism, and it was in a remote area of South India that she found the authentic life she sought. Inspired by ...
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Dora Scarlett's life spanned the 20th century and was influenced by its great social movements. "A drop-out before the term was invented", she ran a smallholding in wartime Devon, became a Communist Party activist, traveled widely behind the Iron Curtain, and worked as a broadcaster at Radio Budapest. Her first-hand experience of the savage Soviet repression of the 1956 Hungarian Uprising destroyed her faith in Communism, and it was in a remote area of South India that she found the authentic life she sought. Inspired by Gandhi, Tolstoy and E F Schumacher, she set up a farm and a free clinic, Seva Nilayam, or "Home of Service," where she lived and worked for 40 years. Drawing on Dora Scarlett's soul-searching unpublished Memoir, her public and private correspondence, and the author's own recollections, this is the story of a strong and independent woman creating an extraordinary life in an India which was rapidly changing. Through her newsletters she shared her delight in the beauty and diversity of Indian village life and admiration of the resilience of rural people. Her clear-eyed compassion touched the lives of many and inspired both local and international co-workers. Her tomb bears the inscription "Work is Love Made Visible" - a fitting epitaph to a remarkable life.
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