This dignified testament by a great spiritual and temporal leader, driven into exile by Communist China is one of the most heart-breaking documents ever published. His Holiness the Fourteenth Dalai Lama of Tibet relates the story of his brief, tumultuous early life in Tibet, culminating in the Chinese invasion. He offers his thoughts on the history, culture and politics of Tibet, and documents the Chinese invasion and his subsequent flight from his homeland.
It paints a rare, intimate portrait of Tibetan Buddhism - a way of life that would end with a terrifying foreign invasion surpassing sanity and reason, and it reveals the evolution of a man from a gentle monk to a world leader.