Knight explores the everyday lives of women of the Baul tradition of musical mystics in India and Bangladesh. She demonstrates that Baul women construct a meaningful life as they navigate between conflicting expectations of Bauls to be carefree and of women to be modest.

In literature and popular imagination, the Bauls of India and Bangladesh are characterized as musical mystics: orange-clad nomads of both Hindu and Muslim backgrounds who wander the countryside and entertain with their passionate singing and unusual behavior. Although Bauls claim to value women over men, little is known about the individual views and experiences of Baul women. Based on ethnographic research, this book explores the everyday lives of Baul women. Knight demonstrates that Baul women respond to the conflicting expectations imposed on them in various ways, sometimes adopting and other times subverting local gendered norms to craft meaningful lives. More so than their male counterparts, Baul women feel encumbered by norms. But rather than seeing Baul women's normative behavior as indicative of their conformity to gendered roles (and, therefore, failures as Bauls), Knight argues that these women creatively draw on societal expectations to transcend their social limits and create new paths.

The dominant tropes imagined for the Baul tradition of eastern India and Bangladesh are constructed around male models: the wandering mistrel carrying his ektara instrument who engages in esoteric ritual practices. Lisa Knight's sensitive ethnography, however, fills in the significant lacunae of the lives and practices of Baul women. She artfully analyzes the ways in which these women bridge the contradictory expectations of Baul traditions as 'wanderers' and those of the non-Baul communities as respectable, settled Bengali householders. This study will significantly impact the ways in which readers understand Baul traditions, asceticism, boundaries of religious identities, and women's agency and performance in South Asia.