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Rosaries, Reading, Secrets: A Catholic Childhood in India. My new memoir

By Anita Mathias

 

Friends, I have written a new memoir. I would be so grateful for your support. It is available  wherever Amazon sells books, Amazon.com, of course, as well as  Amazon.co.uk.

Here are some reviews from distinguished writers

A beautifully written account of a childhood.  The textures, colours and, above all, the tastes of a particular world are lyrically but also precisely evoked. But, although Mathias rightly celebrates the richness of that world, she weaves through this magical remembrance of things past a skein of sadness that makes it haunting.  It’s lovely!

Francesca Kay, An Equal Stillness

Mathias invites us into a totally absorbing world of past and present marvels, generously laced with poetic and literary references and Dickensian levels of observation and detail. A beautifully written, important, and addictive book.

                                                                       Jenny Lewis, Gilgamesh Retold

 A dazzling, vibrant tale of the childhood of “the naughtiest girl in school” whose sweet tooth is exceeded only by her insatiable appetite for language and stories. Mathias conjures 1960s India, and her extended family in uproarious and heartbreaking detail.

Erin Hart, Haunted Ground

 Joining intelligent winsomeness with an engaging style, Anita Mathias writes with keen observation, lively insight and hard-earned wisdom about navigating the life of thoughtful faith in a world of cultural complexities. Her story bears witness to how God wastes nothing and redeems all. Her words sing of a spirit strong in courage, compassion and a pervasive dedication to the adventure of life. As a reader, I have been challenged and changed by her beautifully told and powerful story – so will you.

Carolyn Weber, Surprised by Oxford

Anita Mathias’s memoir is a remarkable account of a Catholic childhood in India. A treasure chest of sights, sounds and scents, it is full of food (always food), books (always books), a family with all its alliances and divisions, and many glimpses of a world which is at once exotic and familiar. A feat of memory and remembrance of a moment in Indian culture, still tinged by the English presence, which yet has universal qualities.

Philip Gooden, The Story of English

Anita Mathias’s beautiful childhood memoir reflects the rich complexities of India’s myriad minorities – in her case the Catholics of Jamshedpur, built by the Tata family, the first planned industrial city in India. The Church figures prominently; one of her childhood tortures is family rosary-saying. Secondly, this is a book about “food, always food,” described in mouth-watering detail. Anita’s reading is hugely wide-ranging (from the Panchatantra and Shakespeare to Dickens) and whenever there is trouble with her parents she plunges into her book. Gossip and social scandals run throughout the book, while at school, she indulges in characteristic naughtiness (locking her class into their classroom, for example). India’s wretched wealth-poverty polarisation forms a backdrop to her story. Tormented, passionate and often sad, this book is immensely readable.

Trevor Mostyn, Coming of Age in The Middle East

Rosaries takes us into the psyche of place, from an insider who has lived and breathed India yet stands at a distance from it, both as a constantly alert observer of the human condition, and as a Catholic negotiating a Hindu culture. This subtle balance of insider and outsider means we are treated to fascinating insights and angles on life in India – its tastes and smells, its quirks and eccentricities, preoccupations and prejudices, told with glorious detail, precision and humour.  Mathias reveals her evolution from naughty girl to writer: how she is shaped by inner and outer worlds to become the independent spirit and artist of language so deliciously demonstrated in this memoir.

Professor Jane Spiro, Testimony of Flight

 Born of extraordinary parents and raised in an Indian steel town, Anita Mathias was blessed with no shortage of brains. She spent her first nine years putting them to endless, delightful mischief, but not without making room for some very advanced learning. With an unprecedented appetite for reading, Anita tore through libraries and every volume she could lay her tiny hands on before leaving for boarding school at nine – which incidentally she adored. Her middle class homelife was a rich array of experiences: the copious quantities of gastronomic delicacies – oh the food! – a strict and strong creative mother, a learned and caring father, a close younger sister, and the large hinterland of an impressively accomplished family. Anita was undoubtedly a dazzling star in the red earth firmament of the industrial landscape of Jamshedpur, and her pluck and charm shine through every page of this beautifully crafted, comprehensive, and erudite memoir.

We wait impatiently for the next episode – which will cover her continued rebellions at a Catholic boarding school before her own religious conversion and entry into Mother Teresa’s convent as a novice.

Ray Foulk, Picasso’s Revenge

 Mathias’s prose is lively and evocative. An enjoyable and accessible book.

Sylvia Vetta, Sculpting the Elephant

 A fascinating description of Mathias’s parents, education, and religious bringing. She is an accomplished writer.    Merryn Williams, Six Women Novelists

And here is a longish description of the book

Rosaries, Reading, Secrets: A Catholic Childhood in India is a lyrical account of Anita Mathias’s rebellious Roman Catholic childhood in India. A vivid recreation of a vanished world.

Mathias was born Roman Catholic through historical accident: Portuguese missionaries converted her ancestral South Indian coastal town of Mangalore in the sixteenth century. However, she grew up in Jamshedpur, North India, “The Steel City,” site of India’s largest steel company, a company town benevolently run by the Zoroastrians of Tata Steel.

There the Catholic church run by American Jesuits provided an all-encompassing universe–Mass, communal rosary at the grotto, the small groups of the Catholic Family Movement and a tightly-knit social life. In a pre-TV world, visiting friends was entertainment, juicy gossip flowed with homemade wine, and children sang, danced, and recited for guests. The private clubs were the other nexus of small-town life–screening open-air Hindi, Hollywood, and European movies almost daily; hosting one-act play competitions, as well as the quiz competitions and flower, fruit and vegetable competitions her mother often won. The club libraries were a jumble of well-thumbed books and ubiquitous Enid Blyton.

Reading was a way of escape from volatile fights with her mother–Grimm and Andersen read repeatedly, Greek myths, Norse myths, and Indian epics in tattered editions and, always, British children’s classics. Her father, a Chartered Accountant, who had returned to India after eight years in England to become head of accounts at Tata Steel, read her beloved stories and poems, acting out Shakespeare plays during midnight feasts, from which she recited speeches at school, aged six, earning a “double promotion,” skipping a school year.

Though you woke and heard the birds croak in Jamshedpur, with its jagged industrial skyline and roaring blast furnaces, it was also a city of parks, gardens, rivers, restaurants rendered magical by childhood’s appetite, and sprawling open-air markets with ducks, chicken and crab sold live for the slaughter;  the ecstatic neon geometry of Indian sweets; mandatory browsing in jewellery shops, and the Mecca of a second-hand bookstore where she steadily traded books to build up an aspirational library of classics.

The dreamy one-acre garden which surrounded the house, with trees to climb with a book, was a paradise to escape to with her pet dogs, ducks and chickens–a jumble of bright flowers, rock gardens, thirty fruit trees,  and vegetable gardens.   To a child, the large bright, airy sixteen-roomed house, originally built for British executives and filled with eccentric books, like a repository of the British Raj, was a formative universe of random reading.

Food was almost a character, everything homemade­­–sweets, pickles, ham, ketchup, wines, liqueurs, squash, and our version of Coca-Cola–an enterprise which required a full-time live-in cook, as the daily battle with dust and laundry needed a full-time live-in housekeeper. Meals–five a day–were events, the day’s scaffolding, and local women best known for their recipes.

With her father’s post-retirement academic job, the family moved into faculty housing on the campus of Xavier Labour Relations Institute, an American Jesuit-run business school in Jamshedpur, whose library, well-stocked with classic American literature and contemporary international drama and poetry, provided an intellectual explosion.

Mathias, irrepressible and rebellious, known as the naughtiest girl in the school, was finally expelled from school, aged nine, for disrupting classes with mischief and continual attempts at running away, and went to a boarding school, St Mary’s Convent, Nainital, run by German nuns in the Himalayas. The virtual end of childhood­–and a new adventure.

I’d be so honoured if you would buy a copy. Thank you

https://amzn.to/3qahEn3

 

 


Read my new memoir: Rosaries, Reading, Secrets: A Catholic Childhood in India (US) or UK.
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Filed Under: Memoir, Writing Tagged With: Indian Catholics, Indian childhood, Indian women, Jamshedpur, Mangalore, memoir, Mumbai, reading, salvation by reading

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My Books

Rosaries, Reading, Secrets: A Catholic Childhood in India

Wandering Between Two Worlds - Amazon.com
Amazon.com

Amazon.co.uk

Wandering Between Two Worlds: Essays on Faith and Art

Wandering Between Two Worlds - Amazon.com
Amazon.com

Amazon.co.uk

Francesco, Artist of Florence: The Man Who Gave Too Much

Francesco, Artist of Florence - Amazom.com
Amazon.com

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The Story of Dirk Willems

The Story of Dirk Willems - Amazon.com
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Premier Digital Awards 2015 - Finalist - Blogger of the year
Runner Up Christian Media Awards 2014 - Tweeter of the year

Recent Posts

  • Change your Life by Changing Your Thoughts
  • Do Not Be Afraid–But Be as Wise as a Serpent
  • Our Failures are the Cracks through which God’s Light Enters
  • The Whole Earth is Full of God’s Glory
  • Mindfulness is Remembering the Presence of Christ with Us
  • “Rosaries at the Grotto” A Chapter from my newly-published memoir, “Rosaries, Reading, Secrets: A Catholic Childhood in India.”
  • An Infallible Secret of Joy
  • Thoughts on Writing my Just-published Memoir, & the Prologue to “Rosaries, Reading, Secrets”
  • Rosaries, Reading, Secrets: A Catholic Childhood in India. My new memoir
  •  On Not Wasting a Desert Experience

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Edna O'Brien

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anita.mathias

So, we dropped in on our daughter Irene, in her fi So, we dropped in on our daughter Irene, in her final year of medical school at Green Templeton College, Oxford, and wandered around with a camera. We then saw an exhibition of paintings by the artist Weimin He of the very same sights we had just seen. Enjoy.
And should you have time, please check out my Christian meditation podcast on changing your life by changing your thoughts. https://anitamathias.com/2023/03/24/change-your-life-by-changing-your-thoughts/ Thank you
https://anitamathias.com/2023/03/24/change-your-li https://anitamathias.com/2023/03/24/change-your-life-by-changing-how-you-think/
Hi Friends, I've recorded a brief meditation you might enjoy this weekend, on metanoia, often translated as repentance, but literally, a new mind, thinking differently (meta, change, nous, mind). This meditation considers vexing contemporary issues, body shape, diet, exercise, fasting, and losing weight, with metanoia, a new mind, attempting to see them with the mind of Christ. Relax and enjoy!
Image of Leonardo's John the Baptist, his final painting.
From my meditation on being as wise as a serpent h From my meditation on being as wise as a serpent https://anitamathias.com/2023/03/13/do-not-be-afraid-but-be-wise-as-a-serpent/
What is the wisdom Jesus recommends?
We go out as sheep among wolves,Christ says.
And, he adds, dangerously some wolves are dressed like sheep. 
They seem respectable-busy charity volunteers, Church people.
Oh, the noblest sentiments in the noblest words,
But they drain you of money, energy, time, your lifeblood. 
How then could a sheep, the most defenceless creature on earth,
Possibly be safe, among wolves,
Particularly wolves disguised in sheep’s clothing?
A sheep among wolves can be safe 
If it keeps its eyes on its Shepherd, and listens to him.
Check in with your instincts, and pay attention to them, 
for they can be God’s Spirit within you, warning you. 
Then Jesus warns his disciples, those sheep among wolves.
Be as wise, as phronimos as a serpent. 
The koine Greek word phronimos
means shrewd, sensible, cautious, prudent.
These traits don’t come naturally to me.
But if Christ commands that we be as wise as a serpent,
His Spirit will empower us to be so.
A serpent is a carnivorous reptile, 
But animals, birds and frogs are not easily caught.
So, the snake wastes no energy in bluster or self-promotion.
It does not boast of its plans; it does not show-off.
It is a creature of singular purpose, deliberate, slow-moving
For much of its life, it rests, camouflaged,
soaking in the sun, waiting and planning.
It’s patient, almost invisible, until the time is right
And then, it acts swiftly and decisively.
The wisdom of the snake then is in waiting
For the right time. It conserves energy,
Is warmed by the sun, watches, assesses, 
and when the time is right, it moves swiftly
And very effectively. 
However, as always, Jesus balances his advice:
Be as wise as a serpent, yes, but also as blameless 
akeraios  as a dove. As pure, as guileless, as good. 
Be wise, but not only to provide for yourself and family
But, also, to fulfil your calling in the world,
The one task God has given you, and no one else
Which you alone, and no one else, can do, 
And which God will increasingly reveal to you,
as you wait and ask.
Hi Friends, Here's a meditation is on the differen Hi Friends, Here's a meditation is on the difference between fear and prudence. It looks at Jesus's advice to be as wise as a serpent, but as blameless as dove. Wise as a serpent... because we go out as sheep among wolves... and among wolves disguised in sheep's clothing.
A meditation on what the wisdom of the snake is... wisdom I wish I had learned earlier, though it's never too late.
Subscribe on Apple podcasts, or on my blog, or wherever you get your podcasts. It's widely available. Thanks
https://anitamathias.com/2023/03/13/do-not-be-afraid-but-be-wise-as-a-serpent/
Once she was a baby girl. And now, she has, today, Once she was a baby girl. And now, she has, today, been offered her first job as a junior doctor. Delighted that our daughter, Irene, will be working in Oxford for the next two Foundation years. Oxford University Hospitals include the John Radcliffe Hospital, and the Churchill Hospital, both excellent.
But first she’s leaving to work at Sunnybrook Hospital in Toronto for two months for her elective. 
Congratulations, Irene! And God bless you!
https:/ Images from a winter in Oxford—my belove https:/ Images from a winter in Oxford—my beloved book group, walks near Christ Church, and Iffley, and a favourite tree, down the country lane, about two minutes from my house. I love photographing it in all weathers. 
And I've written a new meditation--ah, and a deeply personal one. This one is a meditation on how our failures provide a landing spot for God's power and love to find us. They are the cracks through which the light gets in. Without our failures, we wouldn't know we needed God--and so would miss out on something much greater than success!!
It's just 6 minutes, if you'd like to listen...and as always, there's a full transcript if you'd like to read it. Thank you for the kind feedback on the meditations I've shared already.
https://anitamathias.com/2023/03/03/our-failures-are-the-cracks-through-which-gods-light-enters/
So last lot of photos from our break in Majorca. F So last lot of photos from our break in Majorca. First image in a stalagmite and stalactite cave through which an undergroun river wended—but one with no trace of Gollum.
It’s definitely spring here… and our garden is a mixture of daffodils, crocus and hellebores.
And here I’ve recorded a short 5 minute meditation on lifting our spirits and practising gratitude by noticing that the whole world is full of God’s glory. Do listen.
https://anitamathias.com/2023/02/24/the-whole-earth-is-full-of-gods-glory/
Our family was in Majorca for 9 sunny days, and he Our family was in Majorca for 9 sunny days, and here are some pictures.
Also, I have started a meditation podcast, Christian meditation with Anita Mathias. Have a listen. https://anitamathias.com/2023/02/20/mindfulness-is-remembering-the-presence-of-christ-with-us/
Feedback welcome!
If you'll forgive me for adding to the noise of th If you'll forgive me for adding to the noise of the world on Black Friday, my memoir ,Rosaries, Reading, Secrets: A Catholic Childhood in India, is on sale on Kindle all over the world for a few days. 
Carolyn Weber (who has written "Surprised by Oxford," an amazing memoir about coming to faith in Oxford https://amzn.to/3XyIftO )  has written a lovely endorsement of my memoir:
"Joining intelligent winsomeness with an engaging style, Anita Mathias writes with keen observation, lively insight and hard earned wisdom about navigating the life of thoughtful faith in a world of cultural complexities. Her story bears witness to how God wastes nothing and redeems all. Her words sing of a spirit strong in courage, compassion and a pervasive dedication to the adventure of life. As a reader, I have been challenged and changed by her beautifully told and powerful story - so will you."
The memoir is available on sale on Amazon.co.uk at https://amzn.to/3u0Ib8o and on Amazon.com at https://amzn.to/3u0IBvu and is reduced on the other Amazon sites too.
Thank you, and please let me know if you read and enjoy it!! #memoir #indianchildhood #india
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