My mother had rubbings from the temple at Angkor Watt on the walls-that was the first thing that interested me. But it really began when I was in my teens, when my mother gave me a copy of A Passage to India. I really came into it from literature-only later did I turn to religious literature. I read Rumer Godden's Mooltiki, and other stories and poems of India (1957) and I read Kipling's Jungle Books. Then I read the Upanishads, and it was just so fascinating to me. I was raised by atheist and communist parents, so we had no religion whatsoever.


About her first introduction to India. - Q&A with Wendy Doniger, the Mircea Eliade Distinguished Service Professor and author of The Hindus

Wendy Doniger O'Flaherty Quotes

My mother had rubbings from the temple at Angkor Watt on the walls-that was the first thing that interested me. But it really began when I was in my...

My mother had rubbings from the temple at Angkor Watt on the walls-that was the first thing that interested me. But it really began when I was in my...

My mother had rubbings from the temple at Angkor Watt on the walls-that was the first thing that interested me. But it really began when I was in my...

My mother had rubbings from the temple at Angkor Watt on the walls-that was the first thing that interested me. But it really began when I was in my...