1952 Vintage Novel "House of Earth" Dorothy and 12 similar items

Roshan, a high-caste Hindu, is born in a little village in India, losing his mother at birth. Both he and his sister Shanti, whom he dearly loves, are endowed with a spirited and questioning nature, and a deep sensitivity. Shanti, however, cannot oppose the Hindu system, and when her early marriage ends in widowhood, she retires to a holy shrine colony. Roshan, meanwhile, grows up in almost constant conflict with the stoic peasant ways of his Brahmin family. He is perplexed by an early and unforgettable introduction to the colony of Bhangis in his village - the Untouchables. He is also impressed by the demands of the Hindu saystem, and the constant economic pressure from village moneylenders and priests. Roshan's father finally leaves the village for the city, to work in the mills for money to pay the family's debts, and does not return. When Roshan goes to the city to find him, he is ill, frail, a sad victim of the city's materialism. They return to the village, and Roshan's marriage is eventually arranged. He is determined to be a companion to his wife, but she is a pure product of the system, and cannot respond to any other treatment than the usual condescending attitude of a Brahmin husband. Roshan is resigned to this fate, and resists the temptation to seek the companionship of the village missionary, whose progressive thinking Roshan has often admired, in spite of his strange religion...