Seeking Bāuls of Bengal

"'Bauls' have become renowned as wandering minstrels and mystics of India and Bangladesh, and are known through their beautiful and often enigmatic songs. They are recruited from both Hindu and Muslim communities, privileging the human being over such identities. Despite their iconic status as representatives of the 'spiritual East', and although they have been the subject of a number of studies, systematic research with Bauls themselves has been largely neglected, Jeanne Openshaw's book is new, not only in analysing the rise of Bauls to their present revered status, but in the depth of its ethnographic research and its reference to the lives of composers and singers as a context for their songs.

The author uses her fieldwork and oral and manuscript materials to lead the reader from conventional historical and textual approaches towards a world defined by people called 'Baul', where the human body and love are primary, and female is extolled above male. This is a compelling story of creativity and dissent even in the face of persecution."--Jacket.