Mohandas Karamchand (Mahatma) Gandhi
Gandhi's nonviolent struggles in South Africa and India had already brought him to such a level of notoriety, adulation, and controversy that when asked to write an autobiography midway through his career, he took it as an opportunity to explain himself. Although accepting of his status as a great innovator in the struggle against racism, violence, and, just then, colonialism, Gandhi feared that enthusiasm for his ideas tended to exceed a deeper understanding. He says that he was after truth rooted in devotion to God and attributed the turning points, successes, and challenges in his life to the will of God. His attempts to get closer to this divine power led him to seek purity through simple living, dietary practices (he called himself a fruitarian), celibacy, and ahimsa, a life without violence. It is in this sense that he calls his book The Story of My Experiments with Truth, offering it also as a reference for those who would follow in his footsteps. A reader expecting a complete accounting of his actions, however, will be sorely disappointed. Amazon.com ReviewThe only English translation of The Story of My Experiments with Truth was done by Gandhi's friend and assistant Mahadev Desai. By modern standards Desai's translation is flowery and liberal, turning passages such as "Everyone should fast and stop work" into "Let all the people of India, therefore, suspend their business on that day and observe the day as one of fasting and prayer." It also bowdlerises the original in places.
United States - authorized edition with forward by Sissela Bok, Beacon Press 1993 reprint: ISBN 0-8070-5909-9
Впервые была издана в СССР в 1934 г. издательством ОГИЗ - СОЦЭКГИЗ под редакцией И.М.Рейснера. Книга получила название "Моя Жизнь". Перевод с английского сделан Р. Ульяновским, им же написано предисловие. Книга издана с сокращениями и с политической правкой. Переиздавалась в 1969г. (другие переводчики и тот же редактор) и в 1989 году в Алма-Ате издательством Жалын.
