VED MEHTA, who was born in kashmir, came to the United Stales in his sixteenth year. He graduated from Pomona College in California, spent two happy years at Balliol College, Oxford, and has recently joined the editorial staff of the NEW YORKER. Both of his books, FACE TO FACE and wALKING THE INDIAN STREETS, hare appeared under the Allantic-Little, Brown imprint.
A Hindu who was born in the Vale of Kashmir twenty-five years ago and blinded by meningitis at the age of three, VED MEHTAcame alone to the United States when he was fifteen to attend the Arkansas School for the Blind. From there he went on to Pomona College, and the maturity and self-assurance which he learned while there he described in his book. FACE TO FACE.
Meningitis robbed VED MEHTA of his sight at the age of three. His father was a Western-trained doctor marked for high place in the Indian Civil Service: but though Ved learned English with his brothers and sisters at home, the educational system of India makes no provision for higher education for the blind. The boy studied Braille, and at the age of fourteen he began typing his letters of appeal to American institutions. After more than thirty rejections he was finally admitted to the Arkansas School for the Blind, and here he began his alteration in a new world. His experiences in India and in America are set forth in his book. Face to Face, to be published this month by Atlantic Little, Blown, from which this is the second of two excerpts.
Meningitis robbed VED MEHTA of his sight at the age of three. His father was a Western-trained doctor marked fur high place in the Indian Civil Service: but though Ved learned English with his brothers and sisters at home, the educational system of India makes no provision for higher education for the blind. The boy studied Braille in a rehabilitation center for wounded veterans, and then at the age of fourteen he began typing his letters of appeal to American institutions. After more than thirty rejections he was finally admitted to the Arkansas School for the Blind, and here he began his liberation in a new world.