Product Description

This is the brilliantly told story of one of the wonders of the modern world - how in less than a hundred years the British made themselves masters of India. They ruled it for another hundred, departing in 1947, leaving behind the independent states of India and Pakistan. British rule taught Indians to see themselves as Indians and its benefits included railways, hospitals, law and a universal language. But the Raj, outwardly so monolithic and magnificent, was always precarious. Its masters knew that it rested ultimately on the goodwill of Indians. This is a new look at a subject rich in incident and character; the India of the Raj was that of Clive, Kipling, Curzon and Gandhi and a host of lesser known others. RAJ will provoke debate, for it sheds new light on Mountbatten and the events of 1946-47 which ended an exercise in benign autocracy and an experiment in altruism.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #64097 in Books
• Published on: 1998-11-05
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 737 pages

Review
'The range, sweep and sheer verve of theb ook are prodigious....A masterpiece.' A N WILSON 'His feeling for historical detail cannot be faulted and is made more engaging by his scholarship and infectious enthusiasm for the subject.' SCOTLAND ON SUNDAY 'With this superb history of the mammoth subject (James') writing career has reached its apogee.' THE TIMES 'James never loses sight of his grand design, yet he still finds room for the telling detail which illuminates and enriches the narrative.' DAILY TELEGRAPH 'James' epic is not only a first rate narrative, but also a penetrating portrait of the British...Having largely, if often inadvertantly, selfishly or ham-fistedly, engineered the world we live in, we need the courage now to face up to our record as coolly and intelligently as Lawrence James has done.' TIMES LITERARY SUPPLEMENT 'Outstanding....An intelligible introduction to a grand subject.' SPECTATOR 'This is a wonderful book about the British presence in India...it will remain unsurpassed in our generation as a scholarly survey for the educated general reader...a superb example of modern narrative history at its bravest' - Jan Morris, THE TIMES

From the Publisher
Critical acclaim for RAJ by Lawrence James
'A wonderful book about the British presence in India, first to last. My guess is that, like the same author’s RISE AND FALL OF THE BRITISH EMPIRE – just as good – it will remain unsurpassed in our generation as a scholarly survey for the educated general reader ... James has chosen to go for the big picture, the grand sweep, and RAJ is a superb example of modern narrative history at its bravest. Brave, because it shirks no issue, pulls no punches and is not frightened by statistics, those fearful instruments of ennui. To call it popular history would demean it, for it is supported by full academic equipment, and has entailed much original research, especially in recently released official documents: but it is rich too in asides and allusions and has all the hallmarks of wide and liberal reading ... A terrific story ... It is all too easy to sentimentalise the heritage of the British in India, but Lawrence James never does that. He tells the story straight, and he hopes (so he says at the end) that it will "make both Britons and Indians look again at their common past without shame or recrimination". It is a noble intention, nobly executed' JAN MORRIS in THE TIMES

'James’s writing is always full of energy and animation; he has an excellent eye for revealing detail, and yet is not afraid to attempt the broad, magisterial sweep ... RAJ makes gripping, opinionated reading: it is a great story, after all, and Lawrence knows how to tell it. It is certainly a far cry from the turgid academese of most modern accounts of the period, and in its sheer scale and ambition represents a terrific feat of research and compression' WILLIAM DALRYMPLE in the SUNDAY TIMES

'A vast and accomplished survey of the different stages of Britain’s dominion. It combines the virtues of old-fashioned narrative history, humanising leading characters with brief descriptions of appearance and background, with a knowledge of recent scholarship and a judicious deliberation of evidence. As a military historian, James is especially good on the frontier and the campaigns which forged the empire, but he is also impressive on the workings of the Raj, its relationship with the princes, and the progress of Indian nationalism. One of the great merits of the book is its sense of balance. James is neither an academic carper nor a Blimpish apologist ... The pages on the massacre at Amritsar, which since Attenborough’s film has come to symbolise British rule in India, show James’s impartiality at its best' DAVID GILMOUR in the INDEPENDENT ON SUNDAY

'A splendid, bone-shaking charge through an episode of our history that only humbugs can look back on without some degree of wonder ... This is a subject historians tend to deal with in chunks, either sawing it in half ... or homing in on specific episodes à la Jan Morris. In opting for the tell-it-all-in-one-volume approach James takes an awful risk: that he succeeds in avoiding generalities and loss of detail is a measure of his skill as a storyteller' CHARLES ALLEN in the SPECTATOR

'A wonderful book ... Enthralling ... As [James] did in his previous book on the British empire, he allows the Indian story to unfold largely through the experiences of the people who lived through the period ... Above all he has managed to bring into sharp focus the lives led by many ordinary people and captured their sense of attachment to Kipling’s "great, grey, familiar India" ... The result is a readable and moving book, wise in its judgements and warm in its appreciation of the best facets of British rule' TREVOR ROYLE in SCOTLAND ON SUNDAY

'Bravely going for a grand narrative sweep, James tells the story of the Raj as a moral epic, ornamented with lots of interesting facts and nuggets of information' SUNIL KHILNANI in the LITERARY REVIEW

'Lawrence James seems to be almost single-handedly making the Empire respectable again ... In RAJ, he energetically takes on what he denounces as "twentieth-century political correctness, post-colonial guilt syndromes and the residual Marxism which still lurks in many university campuses", and does it in great style. This account is written unapologetically from the British point of view, but James has also mastered the sometimes complex and subtle Indian concepts of caste, religion, pre-Mutiny sensitivities, thuggee, suttee and even inter-tribal relations on the North-West Frontier' ANDREW ROBERTS in the MAIL ON SUNDAY

'A rollickingly readable military and political history is only enhanced here by James’s alertness to the very different ways in which redcoat rule was experienced by both sexes and all sides' MICHAEL KERRIGAN in the SCOTSMAN

'Lawrence James has chosen to tackle this great subject by a largely narrative approach, deployed with much skill. The reader is eased through a long and complex book, underpinned by a formidable amount of research, by the clarity of the exposition and the high quality of the writing' P. J. MARSHALL in the TLS

About the Author
Lawrence James was born in Bath and was educated at the University of York and Merton College, Oxford. After a distinguished teaching career he has emerged as one of the outstanding narrative historians of his generation.

Customer Reviews

An superb survey of a key part of British and Indian history
This book takes a wide perspective on a key component of both British and Indian history. He deals impressively with matters as diverse as racial attitudes, the part played by the Raj in Britain's position in the ninteenth century world, and the rise of Indian nationalism. All of this is done in a readable and engaging manner which must mark it down as one of the best surveys of this immense subject that have been written in recent years.

Brilliant!
This is a very good piece of work by Lawrence James. I like his style of writing which is simple, effective and oftentimes humorous. I don't hesitate in reccomending it. I picked this little gem up from a discount book store at a store in West London when I was studying as an undergraduate. Great book - do buy it.

A realistic view in a world of political correctness
James has produced a definitive account of the British Empire's greatest achievement without succumbing to the political correctness that clouds our ability to analyse and conclude based solely on the facts and the views of the time. The book traces the path from the initial fedual oligarchies with whom other nations and peoples had traded for centuries to the creation of the jewel of the world's largest empire to the today's position as the largest democracy in the world. This is an account of which both Indians and Britons should be immensely proud. From the British perspective, the legacy is a large and stable democracy able to solve its own problems as a largely united people under the rule of law. A country with an infrastructure and an open democratic process that is the envy of many other bankrupt, tribal and murderous ex-colonies of the European powers. For the Indians, a sense of proud nationhood not forged through brutal civil war and genocide and a true place and identity in the modern world. They retain a true love of Britain as a grateful friend.
I would recommend this book to those who wish to learn about a shared history through analysis of truth and facts