Leela: A Patchwork Life by Leela Naidu

Leela Naidu could have written this book herself, but Jerry Pinto wrote this book on her behalf. It is a very well written book.

It gave great glimpses of Leela's life. Although she had worked with some of the best Indian film-makers, she was not really drawn to the Bombay film industry. For instance, there were many actresses who dreamt to work with the great Raj Kapoor, but not Leela. He repeatedly offered her to work in his films but she declined his offers. Unlike many Indian actresses, she got married early in life and left  the Bombay film industry. Unfortunately, her marriage did not last long. At a later point in her life, she married the poet, Dom Moraes.

They were one of the most sought-after couples in India. Leela was beautiful and talented, and Dom a fiercely gifted poet. Leela, for instance, worked only in few films, and yet she was known for her work and beauty; one can say the same for Dom, as a poet he was not prolific, but he wrote some of his best poetry before he turned thirty, and made a mark. For instance, someone like W. H. Auden praised his work and supported him in his literary pursuit. I suppose what is truly unique about their success is their intelligence and passion they have shown in their respective fields. It would have been a very interesting book had she shared more about her life with Dom.

After living on several continents, Leela and Dom returned to Bombay where they lived until the very end. These last years must be taxing for her because of her fragile health and problems with Dom (I read Dom's memoirs and saw how (un-Indian) he was, and how completely he was cut off from an ordinary Indian life. It was also very clear that when he left India as a young boy, he left it for good. But life brought him back to the city that he left so decisively a couple of decades earlier. At some level, this coming back might have been tortuous for him. I reviewed him here https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1602357.My_Son_s_Father).

Even though Leela loved Dom, he was not an easy man and had a complicated history. One day he told Leela that he was going to the Taj to buy meat, he never returned. That must have been painful to Leela. Many years later she got to know from Dom's ex-girlfriend that he had left her in the same manner. Towards the last years of her life, Leela was alone and largely lived indoors because of her health issues.

It is a good book to read. Very neat (here I mean it as a compliment). It gives a glimpse into the lives of two very fascinating people. The book, in some ways, is a reminder that at the end it is not the success or the fame that matters; it is the love that matters. What matters is the lives that one has touched. On this count, they both failed each-other.