In her new novel, Leela’s Gift, English faculty member Janet Levine combines modern philosophy and primal wisdom with teachings of Buddhism and the Enneagram of Personality. Leela, a New Yorker traveling through the Himalayas, undertakes an unexpected inner-journey, and under the guidance of a yogi master achieves spiritual realization. Upon her return to the U.S., she struggles to share the combined teachings of East and West—maintaining that yoga and meditation offer practical paths to quieting the busyness of our contemporary lives.
Janet Levine has been published in the New York Times Magazine, the Boston Globe, the Yale Review and has appeared on national television as a commentator on South Africa. A South African native, Janet was an anti-apartheid activist, freelance journalist and twice-elected public official. She was the only white journalist in South Africa to have a weekly column in a black newspaper. You can read about Janet’s political life in her memoir Inside Apartheid.
