Love and Life Behind the Purdah (Paperback or Softback)

Love and Life Behind the Purdah (1901) is a collection of short stories by Indian writer, lawyer, and social reformer Cornelia Sorabji. Raised by Christian missionaries, Sorabji trained as a lawyer at Oxford University before returning to India to work with women and orphans across the country. Her fictional work illustrates a creative imagination and well-rounded sense of the diverse political and religious identities that make up the population of India.

In her first published book, Sorabji spins tales of women and children from varied sociopolitical backgrounds. Writing on the Hindu purdahnashin―women cut off from the outside world―Sorabji drew on her experience as a litigator representing these oppressed figures in legal cases regarding property rights and other instances of oppression. Other stories in the collection follow Zoroastrian priestesses and the lives of orphaned children, character studies which serve as crucial catalysts for the discussion of child marriage, the practice of sati, and other controversial traditions prominent in India in the nineteenth century. Love and Life Behind the Purdah is a beautiful, informative meditation on the necessity of perseverance in the face of famine, disease, silence, and death. A lawyer at heart, Sorabji weaves powerful political commentary into her vibrant prose portraits of women and children down, but never out.

This edition of Cornelia Sorabji’s Love and Life Behind the Purdah is a classic work of Indian literature reimagined for modern readers.

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With thousands of titles in our collection, we aim to spotlight diverse public domain works to help them find modern audiences. Mint Editions celebrates a breadth of literary works, curated from both canonical and overlooked classics from writers around the globe.

Cornelia Sorabji (1866-1954) was an Indian writer, lawyer, and social reformer. Born to Reverend Sorabji Karsdji and Francina Ford, prominent Christian missionaries and converts from Hinduism, Sorabji was raised in Belgaum and Pune. Educated in mission schools and at home, she became the first female graduate of Bombay University before travelling to England in 1889. In 1892, she became the first woman ever to take the Bachelor of Civil Law exam at Oxford University. Sorabji returned to India in 1894 to work as a lawyer representing purdahnashins, women barred from communicating with the outside world. Over the course of her decades-long career, Sorabji assisted over 600 women and orphans with their legal needs, often for free. She was also a successful author of articles, books, and such short story collections as Love and Life Behind the Purdah (1901). A staunch opponent of Mahama Gandhi’s campaign of civil disobedience for Indian self-rule, Sorabji was a controversial figure who stood at the crossroads of the British Raj and the modern Republic of India.