The High-Caste Hindu Woman … With Introduction by Rachel L. Bodley … Dean of Women's Medical College of Pennsylvania … [Authorized English Edition].

1888. London, George Bell and Son, 1888. Small 4to. Original boards lettered in brown and red, ornamented in red, patterned endpapers; pp. xxviii, [2], 66, portrait frontispiece with tissue guard and portrait of Anandibai Joshee, printed slip pasted in at the beginning dtating thet the proceeds of this book will gor to towards a Training house for the education of High-Caste Hindhu women, especially of child-widows, additional wood-engraved portrait of the author from a newspaper pasted onto tissue guard, 1880s ownership inscription to front fly-leaf; light rubbing and discolouration of boards, even light toning to paper, as usual, a very good copy. First English edition. A very rare and important work which had come out first in 1887 in the US in a rather shabby edition, which has never been found in a good state of preservation. This is the first book by an Indian woman to deal with the dark side of Hindu society, child marriage, sexual violence, slavery, and wife murder. Pundita Ramabai was an immensely influential activist, feminist and social reformer, whose influece is still felt in India today. This edition was produced in memoriam of Anandibai Joshee, one of the earliest Indian female physicians, who after medical training in the US had died at the age of 22 in Poona of tuberculosis.