At Home and the World in Iraq 1915-17: part 2
ChrestomatherThe tension between the voices of the grandmother and the military historian runs through the length of Mokkhoda-debi’s Kalyan-Pradeep. It is reflected even in the form of the…
The ‘Home and the World’ in Iraq 1915-17: Part 1
Mokkhoda (Mokshada) Debi’s Kalyan Pradeep, (published 1928)is, in essence, the author's tribute, as a grandmother, to her daughter’s son, Kalyan, who was a casualty of the…
From Iraq 1915-17: Lost Treasures of Indian Writing
Race, Empire and First World War Writing (ed. Santanu Das, Cambridge University Press, 2011) is an ambitious collection: it attempts to cover the whole spectrum of non-European…
‘When the War Began We Heard of Several Kings’
Among recent publications on the Indian role in the First World War, one of the most important is a collection entitled When the War Began We Heard of…
‘Indian Voices of the Great War’
The last few years have seen a long-overdue awakening of interest in the Indian soldiers and auxiliaries who participated in the First World War (it goes without…
‘Touch and Intimacy in First World War Literature’
First World War writing is an old interest of mine so when I came upon a book with the intriguing title 'Touch and Intimacy in the First World War I…
Journey to the ‘Heart of Whiteness’
A turban used by an Indian Sepoy Of all the colonies of the European empires, British India contributed the highest number of men, estimated around one and…
Philip Hensher’s ‘Scenes from Early Life’
I met Philip Hensher in 2008: his novel, The Northern Clemency, was on the Booker Prize shortlist that year, as was my Sea of Poppies. …
Ludu U Sein Win and the School of ‘Feeling, Mood and Action’ in Yangon
On Sunday June 17, the democracy movement in Myanmar lost one of its pillars, Ludu U Sein Wein. Ludu U Sein Win, Jan 1996 …
The ‘Red Mowlana’ and the Last Emperor of China: Part 6
From Mao-Tse Tung-er Deshe (In 'Mao Tse-tung’s Country' by Maulana Abdul Hamid Khan Bhashani), pp. 48-49 On May 1, 1962, Pu Yi married for the second time.…