哈金：......我認識一位母親是韓國人的男作家，他寫了一本回憶錄，但出版商逼他改成小說出版，因為沒有人對亞裔男人的自傳感興趣。..... 《錯過的時光：哈金詩選》，頁220
The Autobiography of an Unknown Indian is the 1951autobiography of Nirad C. Chaudhuri, an Indian writer. Written when he was around 50, it records his life from his birth in 1897 in Kishorganj, a small town in present-day Bangladesh.
Herbert Simon's MODELS OF MY LIFE
Arguably, his
magnum opus considering his literary output that he could generate as late age as ninety years, Autobiography is not a single book, it is many. Consciously or unconsciously he has left traces of all his erudition, his spirit and learning. Declaring himself a cartographer of learning, the book is also a cartographic evidence of the author's mind and its varied geographies, of the map as well as of the mind.
The dedication of the book runs thus:
| “ | To the memory of the British Empire in India,
Which conferred subjecthood upon us,
But withheld citizenship.
To which yet every one of us threw out the challenge:
"Civis Britannicus sum"*
Because all that was good and living within us
Was made, shaped and quickened
By the same British rule.
| ” |
Over the years, the Autobiography has acquired many distinguished admirers.
Winston Churchill thought it one of the best books he had ever read.
V. S. Naipaul remarked: "No better account of the penetration of the Indian mind by the West - and by extension, of the penetration of one culture by another - will be or now can be written." In 1998, it was included, as one of the few Indian contributions, in The New Oxford Book of English Prose .
*
The Latin phrase
civis romanus sum (
cīvis rōmānus sum) (
Classical Latin: [ˈkiːwɪs roːˈmaːnʊs ˈsʊm],
I am a Roman citizen) is a phrase used in
Cicero's In Verrem as a plea for the legal rights of
a Roman citizen.
[1] When travelling across the Roman Empire, safety was said to be guaranteed to anyone who stated Civis Romanus Sum.
In the
New Testament,
Paul the Apostle, when imprisoned and on trial, claimed his right as a Roman citizen to be tried before
Caesar, and the judicial process had to be suspended until he was brought to Rome:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civis_romanus_sum
The Latin phrase civis romanus sum (cīvis rōmānus sum) is a phrase used in Cicero's In Verrem as a plea for the legal rights of a Roman citizen. When travelling ...
www.telegraph.co.uk › Comment › Letters
Oct 19, 2000 - In his Civis Britannicus Sum speech to the House of Lords, Palmerston poured derision on those who suggested that protection should not be ...
1:14:01
