Nuggets of nostalgia
VANI DORAISAMY
THY DAUGHTERS' VOICES - Women's Christian College Ninety Years of Dedicated Service: Pub. by Alumnae Association of Women's Christian College.
As far as Chennai landmarks go, this one is in a class by itself: the Grecian-style mansion on the banks of the Cooum is not something the eye can easily miss. That it houses one of the city's best known women's colleges, Women's Christian College, is also well known. History, however, lies in details and how the two — the house and the college — found each other is the stuff of expert chronicling. Which is what Thy Daughters' Voices sets out to do.
The 291-page volume is every alumnus' dream, chronicling everything from the evolution of the college in 1912 to its present iconic status. The unfinished labour of love of the late Vera Augustus, head of the college's history department, it took several more meticulous research attempts to piece together the volume.
The beginnings
The embryo for the college was born in a United Free Church of Scotland Mission conference in 1912, when the college's first principal, Eleanor McDougall, issued the mission statement to "liberate the latent energies in India's women" and "to infuse in them the vital ideals of Christianity." The college itself was born on July 7, 1915 and was located in Hyde Park house, Kilpauk. Then came Doveton House, the Grecian structure, almost as if by a divine will. The house was already steeped in history: the Gaekwad of Baroda had undergone a brief imprisonment in 1875 and the Indian National Congress had met on its grounds in 1914. The move might never have happened, had it not been for a stroke of serendipity. Just when McDougall had finished inspecting the mansion and had found it "most suitable but beyond their means", word had come of a generous grant made out of the legacy of Laura Rockfeller, which made the impossible possible.
Features
The volume bustles with rare nuggets of nostalgia: when the first hostel building was constructed, the names and photographs of the first hosteliers from 1915 to 1917 were buried under the threshold, as they "were destined for immortality." What warms the heart, however, are the life stories of the women who made the college: such as Marjories Sykes, who came to the college in 1942 from Shantiniketan to work in the English department, wanted to live "in the community" and moved into a small house at the Mohammedan Gardens neighbourhood (off Greames Road), ironed out student differences over participating in the Quit India Movement, gave away her home to start a nursery for neighbourhood kids and went to work on a bicycle.
Spread out in thoughtfully laid-out chapters, the volume is steeped in nostalgia, but still has its ear to the ground as far as modern times go. The best part of the book, at least for this reviewer, is the nostalgic account by Ms. S. Ananthakrishnan, retired professor and head of the college's botany department, of the flora and fauna in what was clearly a scrub jungle on the banks of the Cooum.
Commemorative volumes are usually known more for their lacklustre presentation than any literary merit: typos, patchy layouts, ghost mistakes and poor writing and editing skills are the norm. Thy Daughters... is a happy exception, it is almost impossible to spot an error. One only wishes, however, that the writing had been crisper and pithier, rather than smack of college journal-ness. A touch of drama would not have been out of place.
Printer friendly
page
Send this article to Friends by
E-Mail
Book Review
