Additional information
by Vasanth Kannabiran (Author)
Description
Gaddar, poet, singer, revolutionary, is among the most well-known of the
creative minds associated with people's resistance movements in India. Born
Gummadi Vittal Rao in 1947, in Tupran village of Medak district in what is
now Telangana, Gaddar became an activist in his youth after dropping out of
engineering college due to poverty. With a gift for singing and song-writing,
he travelled the road-for some time underground-reaching lakhs of people
with his music, and became the cultural face of 'rebellion', the literal meaning
of his nom de guerre.
Of the thousands of songs Gaddar performed, only a few were ever recorded
in print. My Life Is a Song brings together, for the first time in English
translation, twenty-three representative songs, selected by his friend and
fellow traveller, Vasanth Kannabiran. Translated from the original Telugu
with an eye to Gaddar's unique style and delivery, this selection takes the
extraordinary 'anthems' of one of India's greatest singer-poets-and a living
legend of revolutionary thought-to a wider audience.
