Helen Keller's triumph over her blindness and deafness has become one of the most inspiring stories of our time. Through movies and plays most notably The Miracle Worker, which portrayed her relationship with her teacher, Anne Sulli-van-Keller's life has become an emblem of hope for people everywhere. Here, in a book first published when she was a young woman, is Helen Keller's own story-complex, poignant, and filled with love.

With unforgettable immediacy, Helen's own words reveal the heart of an exceptional woman, her strug-gles and joys, including that memorable moment when she finally understands that Anne's finger-spelled letters w-a-t-e-r mean the fluid rush-ing over her hand. Helen Keller was always a com-passionate and witty advocate for the handicapped, and her sincere and eloquent memoir is deeply moving for the sighted and the blind, the deaf and the hearing.

"Her spirit will endure," said Senator Lister Hill at her funeral, "as long as man can read and stories can be told of the woman who showed the world there are no boundaries to courage and faith."