|
In any time, Alexandra David-Neel
would have been considered an extraordinary woman, but in the
Victorian era, she was truly exceptional. Born in 1868, David-Neel
eschewed the dances, dinners, and formal marriages common to
women of her era and social standing in order to indulge her
fierce independence and insatiable intellectual curiosity. Her
interest in comparative religions dated back to early childhood;
even as a student in a Catholic convent school, she kept statues
of both Christ and the Buddha in her room. She made her first
trip to Asia in 1891, then supported herself as a light-opera
singer and journalist before marrying a seemingly conventional
man, Philip Neel. Fortunately for both Alexandra David-Neel and
for posterity, Philip was less stodgy than his position as a
well-off engineer might imply; though he did not accompany her,
he supported his wife's explorations and even acted as her
literary agent when she began to write about the places she
visited. Alexandra and Philip remained the closest of friends
until his death in 1941.
David-Neel spent years traveling
in India and China, but perhaps her most daring adventure was
the trip to Tibet's forbidden city of Lhasa. She was 55 years
old at the time, fluent in Tibetan and well versed in both
Sanskrit and Buddhism. Disguised as a man, she spent four
treacherous months on the road before finally becoming the first
European woman ever to enter Lhasa. My Journey to Lhasa
is David-Neel's own account of her astounding journey, one
fraught with hardship and danger. It is both a chronicle of a
bygone time and a testimonial to a remarkable human.
|
