Koteshwaramma, a child widow at 7 or 8, wrote this autobiography when she was 90. “You seem to live only to cry all your life”, her mother said to her as she lay on her deathbed; indeed a life spent picking herself up from one tragedy to another. Yet that is not what you’ll feel when you read through each chapter, unfolding parts of her life. You will see how resilient, dignified, and composed she had been in the face of it all. Sitaramayya (her husband and a frontline leader of the Telangana Peasants Movement), said that he wanted to stay single and dedicate himself to the movement, yet he married Koteshwaramma because he was convinced by the party elders that marrying a patriotic woman would be an asset to the movement - perhaps this was why, after years in exile, he could abandon her, saying, “You were once a widow. Yet, I married you and gave you some recognition in society.” It was nonetheless cathartic to read her refusal to reunite with him as he died a lonley death…and she being celebrate...rightfully so…
What stayed with them
Her resilience, and dignity, to face everything life threw at her, with her held high.
What they disagreed with
Moment of her acceptance of misogyny, because 'that's just how men were'.
Who should read it
Everybody
That education is the doorway to independence, and must be pursued at all cost...
