The much publicized burning of a young Rajput widow from the state of Rajasthan in 1987 renewed intense debate on the subject of Sati. Long a topic of horrified fascination—how can a woman commit herself to death on her husband’s funeral pyre, then actually carry through with it—Sati is at once both a powerful symbol of Otherness for the west and an act proving a woman’s sacredness and spiritual power in the Hindu world. Ashes of Immortality attempts to ...
