This week I’m hosting Kay Marshall Strom with The Hope of Shridula, JoAnn Durgin with Second Time Around, Dora Hiers with Journey’s End, and Zeke Lam with Submission (non-fiction). If you want to enter the drawings for the books, please leave a comment on one of the post during the week with your email address. I will not enter you without an email address (my way to contact you if you win). If you don’t want to leave an email address, another way you can enter is to email me at margaretdaley@gmail.com. The drawings end Sunday (March 11th) evening.
Interview with the heroine from The Hope of Shridula by Kay Marshall Strom:
1. Shridula, tell me the most interesting thing about you.
I am an untouchable and a girl. I know nothing but slavery. What could be interesting about me? Well, I can read. My father taught me out of his Bible. But no one must know. No, no, never!
2. What do you do for fun?
My karma is to work. I watched my mistress paint and listened to her play the sitar, and that was nice. I could never do those things, of course. Oh, and I ate a mango once. A whole mango.
3. What do you put off doing because you dread it?
Anything that will make me face the landlord. He is a terrible man.
4. What are you afraid of most in life?
That I will have to be a slave my entire life. My father was, and my mother, too. My mother tells me to be satisfied that I have rice to eat. Well, I am not satisfied. I dream of leaving, but then I wake up. I am most afraid my mother’s words will be true forever.
5. What do you want out of life?
To be able to walk outside when I want and stay inside, out of the monsoon rains when I so desire. To collect fruit and nuts to eat. To see the marketplace. High caste people are free. Why shouldn’t I be, too?
6. What is the most important thing to you?
Freedom! I might wish to be a boy, because boys are not cursed. Or to be high-caste, because God loves them. But I would willingly stay who I am if I could just be free.
7. Do you read? If so, what is your favorite type of book to read?
Untouchables are forbidden to learn to read, but I’ll tell you a secret: My father has an English Bible a missionary gave him when he was very young, and he taught me to read from it. I pretend I can’t, but I can.
8. If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be?
Well, I suppose I would change my caste. I cannot imagine what it would be like to be high-caste, but I know it would be wonderful. Even a high-caste lady, who can paint and read and listen to the radio and play music.
9. Do you have a pet? If so, what is it and why that pet?
No, no. I would like to have goat, but what would I feed it?
10. If you could travel back in time, where would you go and why?
Long ago, my father says, a man named Jesus lived. I would go and meet him and ask, “How can some people say they follow you, but still be so cruel?” And then I would ask if I could follow him, because he is gentle and kind.
