Ruby of Cochin: An Indian Jewish Woman Remembers

Ruby of Cochin: An Indian Jewish Woman Remembers by Daniel, Ruby. hardcover edition. ISBN: 9780827605398.

Ruby Daniel was born in Jew Town, Cochin, India, at a time when the ancient and modern ways of life met. She writes, "Sometimes I wish I was born 50 years earlier or 50 years later. But it happened in December 1912. Times were beginning to change, and we were in the middle;… [W]omen didnt talk about their lives then; they just kept quiet. If I explain what has happened to me, it may give an idea of other women who were born at that time" Ruby of Cochin is the first book written by a Jewish woman from Cochin. It is a rich description of Jewish life on the Southwest Coast of India, spanning many centuries. It is the story of one woman – yet it is also the story of all the Jews of Cochin, from the earliest settlements, when the Maharajah granted the Jews their land and privileged status, until today, when a transplanted Cochin community is finding new life in Israel. The book is written with a distinctive storytellers voice and contains historical legends, ghost tales, colorful renditions of Jewish celebrations in Cochin, and translations of Jewish womens songs from Malayalam, the language of the Cochin Jews. The book is also Rubys own memoir of her dramatic life in India. Ruby relates, "when I began to write down all these stories from the past, my first intention was to show how good the people were in Malabar, how they welcomed the Jews and treated them well for 2000 years. I did not think I would write very much about my own life. But then I thought, I want to write about the situation of women in my generation, about their sufferings and all. I cant bring it out unless I write about myself and what happened to me. It is important for people today to know about what happened... before they were born. To know about the lives of ordinary women, people who were not known in this world. Wildflowers who bloom in the forest. Nobody sees them and they fade."