If you like travelling and if you like reading you probably will like the books by Ella Maillart. In a vivid way she lets you take part in what she has seen of countries barely known to Westerners, of foreign cultures, and of different ways of life. While her journeys must have been quite adventurous her books go far beyond this aspect. The fabric of her travel accounts is finely interwoven with facts about the history and politics of the regions she has visited. You learn about people and cultures passed long ago and you get some impressions of the political situation around the time of her expeditions.
Ella Maillart, the famous traveller visited Kumar, more than once. She was introduced by Nita Thapar, of the well-known Thapar family in India. Maillart was on a sabbatical in India to discover, as described by her own self, her ‘inner self’. She would spend the whole day leafing through travel books, particularly pouring over the Elephantine Folio of Sir Auriel Stein, the well-known archaeologist of Central Asia. There was a peace within her. Later, in one of her communication, Nita Thapar expressed that Maillart described the huge collection of books in the drawing room as ‘navigating around an enormous Indian divan …with books all around’.
Ella Maillart was born in 1903 in Geneva, Switzerland. She gained international recognition as an expert for Asia, an ethnologist, and a writer with her many books,chief among them being, "Des Monts célestes aux Sables rouges" (1934) and "Oasis interdits. De Pékin au Cachemire" (1937). At age 20 she sailed in a small boat on the Mediterranean and over the Atlantic to England. She participated in the Swiss sailing team at the Olympic games in 1924 in Paris. She founded the first women hockey team of Switzerland and took part in international ski races. Later Ella Maillarts interest turned to variety of cultures and people in Asia. From 1930 until the late 50s she travelled the region many times, in particular the Soviet Union, Afghanistan, China, Tibet, India, Nepal. Her last trip she made at the age of 83 to Tibet. The remaining years she spent in Switzerland, in Geneva and the mountain valleys of the Wallis. She died on March 27, 1997.