1946 · First edition · One of 3,000 copies

The Gospel of Selfless Action, or The Gita According to Gandhi

Translation of the original in Gujarati, with an additional introduction and commentary

Mahadev Desai

Ahmedabad, August 1946. First edition, first printing—one of only 3,000 copies. Mahadev Desai’s English rendering of Gandhi’s Gujarati interpretation of the Bhagavad Gita, preserved in the original cloth-backed publisher’s boards. Very good and complete.

A remarkably evocative survival of the first edition of Gandhi’s interpretation of the Bhagavad Gita, prepared and translated into English by his closest literary collaborator and secretary, Mahadev Desai (1892–1942), and published less than a year before Indian independence.

The book grew directly from the extraordinary relationship between Gandhi and Desai. Gandhi’s Gujarati rendering made the Gita a practical manual for ethical action grounded in anasakti—non-attachment to the fruits of one’s work. Desai rendered that meaning into English and surrounded it with an extensive introduction and commentary, preserving Gandhi’s reading of India’s foundational philosophical text for an international audience.

Desai undertook much of this scholarship during imprisonment in 1933–34. Following his sudden death after the Quit India arrests of 1942, the manuscript became a literary testament. Its publication in August 1946 places this first printing in an exceptional historical interval: conceived within Gandhi’s intellectual world, prepared under colonial imprisonment, and issued on the eve of independence.

Publication

Ahmedabad: Navajivan Publishing House, August 1946

Edition

First edition · First printing · One of 3,000 copies

Pagination

392 pages

Language

English and Sanskrit

Format

Octavo · Original pale grey-green paper-covered boards backed in cloth

Completeness

Complete. The Sanskrit text, English translation, introduction and extensive commentary are present. The verso retains the explicit statement “FIRST EDITION, 3000, AUGUST, 1946.”

Condition

Very good. Complete. A well-preserved copy in the publisher’s original cloth-backed pale grey-green boards, retaining the printed title, author attribution and Navajivan device to the upper cover. The binding remains sound and the volume presents attractively. The boards show light natural toning, handling and minor surface wear expected of the original utilitarian binding, with modest wear principally at the extremities and spine cloth. Internally the leaves are clean and well preserved, with occasional light age-toning and minor spotting consistent with an eighty-year-old Indian publication.

Status

Available

Price

US$1,200