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About the Author

ANANDA K. COOMARASWAMY (1877-1947) was born to Anglo-Ceylonese parents. After completing studies in Geology he soon became interested in the arts and crafts of his native Ceylon and India. In 1917 he relocated to the USA where he became Keeper of Indian and Islamic Art at the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, establishing a large collection of Eastern artifacts and presenting lectures on their symbolic and metaphysical meaning. An encounter with the seminal writings of perennialist author Rene Guenon served to confirm and strengthen his view of the Perennial Philosophy. From this period onwards Dr. Coomaraswamy began to compose his mature--and undoubtedly most profound--works, adeptly expounding the "philosophia perennis" by drawing on his unparalleled knowledge of the arts, crafts, mythologies, cultures, folklores, symbolisms, and religions of the Orient and the Occident. His plans to retire to India and take on sannyasa (renunciation of the world) were cut short by his sudden and untimely death.