276°
Posted 20 hours ago

Courting India: England, Mughal India and the Origins of Empire

£15£30.00Clearance
ZTS2023's avatar
Shared by
ZTS2023
Joined in 2023
82
63

About this deal

India was a huge continental empire, England a minor maritime kingdom on the fringe of Europe; but with their itchy feet the English were pushing to expand global trade.

Using an incisive blend of Indian and British records, and exploring the art, literature, sights, and sounds of Elizabethan London and Imperial India, Das portrays the nuances of cultural and national collision on an individual and human level. Things began to go awry almost as soon as the squadron of ships bearing Thomas Roe, the first English ambassador to the Mughal Empire, sighted India’s western shores in September 1615. She is a scholar of Renaissance literature, travel, migration, and cross-cultural encounters, and has published widely on these topics, from major sixteenth and seventeenth century authors like Philip Sidney, Shakespeare and Cervantes, to the fleeting presence of three Japanese boys in sixteenth century Portuguese-held Goa, India. Conflicts over precedence did nothing to advance his mission of securing trade rights, which was the real reason Roe had been sent across the Indian Ocean.By using contemporary sources by Indian and by British political figures, officials and merchants she has given the story an unparalleled immediacy that brings to life these early encounters and the misunderstandings that sometimes threatened to wreck the whole endeavour.

For Das the Roe mission is the lens through which to give sharp focus to a remarkably wide-ranging study that does much to illuminate the bigger story of the unpromising origins of British power - and initial powerlessness - in India . There are some great anecdotes about the discomforts and indignities suffered by Roe, in part self-inflicted (such as refusing to learn the language or give up wearing British-style clothes in the extreme heat) but also due to the penny-pinching ways of the East India Company. The British Academy Book Prize, formerly known as the Nayef Al-Rodhan Prize, was established in 2013, to reward and celebrate the best works of non-fiction that demonstrate rigour and originality, and have contributed to public understanding of other world cultures and their interaction. The book recasts the story of Britain and India, moving us beyond a Eurocentric telling with an even-handed, entertaining tale of the encounter of two cultures and the ambitions, misunderstandings and prejudices that came to the fore. Stretching from the dark waters of the Thames to the blossom-strewn floors of the Jahangiri Palace, Courting India covers a vast canvass with masterful aplomb.Drawing on a rich variety of sources – literature, the memoirs of the Mughal Emperor Jahangir, the journals and correspondence of Sir Thomas Roe, plus the archives of the East India Company – Das invites the reader to get to grips with the making of history, and its narration from both perspectives.

Asda Great Deal

Free UK shipping. 15 day free returns.
Community Updates
*So you can easily identify outgoing links on our site, we've marked them with an "*" symbol. Links on our site are monetised, but this never affects which deals get posted. Find more info in our FAQs and About Us page.
New Comment