ABSTRACT
it has been said that future ages will regard Gandhi as the most remarkable man of our time. In his own country he was a legendary hero long before his death; there is material enough, in his acts and sacrifices, to merge the hero into saint. “Mahatma” is already more than a reverent title, and his “autobiography” 1 is a didactic gospel. But it is also more—and less. It is as detailed and banal as a provincial newspaper; it is colourless and often tedious; it is disconcertingly honest and unaffectedly modest. It has neither fire nor force, and its monotony is never redeemed by the remotest breath of poetry. And yet the reading of it is a moving, an unforgettable experience. We have a Golden Legend from the Middle Ages; this is the first book of a Leaden Legend.
