mores. There is a fascinating account of how Gandhi, who had made a vow to his mother before leaving India to remain a vegetarian, joined the vegetarian movement in London, which brought him into first contact with such vital Christian and Western writers as Tolstoi, Ruskin and Thoreau, strengthening in him a peculiarly Indian intuition and yet also a critical ability. Gandhi developed an inclusive identity, that of an enlightened citizen of the British Empire, willing neither to abandon vital ties with his native tradition, nor to sacrifice a Western education which helped him to defeat British plans. He looked for local events of high symbolic value in order to mobilise Indian masses, spiritually and politically. These included a campaign to improve water supply during the plague epidemic of 1917, the movement against salt tax and his support of the mill workers of Ahmedabad by fasting and by 'Satyagraha'?'the truth method'. Erikson draws interesting comparisons between Freud and Gandhi. Freud was approaching middle age when he faced the probability that an oppres- sive education and resulting inner repression can lead to a mortal prejudice against oneself. Gandhi was over 40 at the time of his first Satyagraha and the rules of his truth force constitute the accept- ance of suffering as an active choice without sub- mission, with a declaration of non-intent to harm others. Gandhi's previous lifelong insistence on the 'innocence' (meaning sexlessness) of children ^r- can be interpreted as an inability to recognise the Farrukh Hashmi on a book 'demon king' within himself and invites a com- which draws comparisons parison with Freud's concept of child sexuality. between Gandhi and Freud. The truth of Satyagraha and the reality of psycho-analysis show the convergence of Gandhi's Rofhssor erikson* is an American psychiatrist and Freud's methods. If it is assumed that man's 0 is well known as a reality-testing includes an attempt to think clearly, ^ e already psycho-historian. visited India in 1962 and, when in the city of to have a clear insight into one's central motiva- was struck its historical tions and faith in the brotherhood of man, psycho- to j?edabad' by similarity Pittsburgh and by the knowledge that this was analysis?like the method suggested by Gandhi? t? e town where, in March 1918?the year of offers a way of intervening non-violently between j son and Lenin, and the year when empires our conscience and our aggression, thus forcing 'aPsed?Mr. M. K. Gandhi chose to fast as part our moral and our animal natures to enter into Q? nCW rnetbod c'v^c and reconciliation. History, looked at in this to h political leadership respectful defend a wage-claim by local millworkers. manner, provides a way in which the pseudo- an^hi failed in his first of can be dis- b non-violent protest, species' mentality warring groups ? Efikson considers this a most important event armed by embracing a wider identity between the r*se to tbe of India. He nations and classes. dis Mahatmaship races, cusses the man, his method and some of his This is an interesting book and will appeal ,^st followers, who gathered around him after this equally to students of Gandhi, social psychologists such a way that his philosophy of militant non- and psychiatrists interested in Transcultural nee became a to be political instrument, ready Psychiatry. ?n a th ^ar2e scale and reaching far beyond ?jssue of a local industrial dispute, author Gandhi's his childhood Gandhi's truth: On the origins of militant non- and analyses past, Erik H. Erikson,* Faber t y?uth, his parents, friends, his education in violence by published by at 50s. ndon and how he came to terms with European & Faber