Product Description

In the Spring of 1857, with India on the brink of a violent and bloody mutiny, Krishnapur is a remote town on the vast North Indian plain. For the British there, life is orderly and genteel. Then the sepoys at the nearest military cantonment rise in revolt and the British community retreats with shock into the Residency. They prepare to fight for their lives with what weapons they can muster. As food and ammunition grow short, the Residency, its defences battered by shot and shell and eroded by the rains, becomes ever more vulnerable. The Siege of Krishnapur is a modern classic of narrative excitement that also digs deep to explore some fundamental questions of civilisation and life.

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Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #2032 in Books
• Published on: 1996-07-01
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 314 pages

Amazon.co.uk Review

"The first sign of trouble at Krishnapur came with a mysterious distribution of chapatis, made of coarse flour and about the size and thickness of a biscuit; towards the end of February 1857, they swept the countryside like an epidemic."

Students of history will recognise 1857 as the year of the Sepoy rebellion in India--an uprising of native soldiers against the British, brought on by Hindu and Muslim recruits' belief that the rifle cartridges with which they were provided had been greased with pig or cow fat. This seminal event in Anglo-Indian relations provides the backdrop for J.G. Farrell's Booker Prize- winning exploration of race, culture and class, The Siege of Krishnapur.

Like the mysteriously appearing chapatis, life in British India seems, on the surface, innocuous enough. Farrell introduces us gradually to a large cast of characters as he paints a vivid portrait of the Victorians' daily routines that are accompanied by heat, boredom, class-consciousness and the pursuit of genteel pastimes intended for cooler climates. Even the siege begins slowly, with disquieting news of massacres in cities far away. When Krishnapur itself is finally attacked, the Europeans withdraw inside the grounds of the Residency where very soon conditions begin to deteriorate: food and water run out, disease is rampant, people begin to go a little mad. Soon the very proper British are reduced to eating insects and consorting across class lines. Farrell's descriptions of life inside the Residency are simultaneously horrifying and blackly humorous. The siege, for example, is conducted under the avid eyes of the local populace, who clearly anticipate an enjoyable massacre and thus arrive every morning laden with picnic lunches (plainly visible to the starving Europeans). By turns witty and compassionate, The Siege of Krishnapur comprises the best of all fictional worlds: unforgettable characters, an epic adventure and at its heart a cultural clash for the ages. --Alix Wilber

Mariella Frostrup, INDEPENDENT ON SUNDAY
"Inspired, funny but ultimately tragic look at colonialism in India. It has an unusual exuberence"

Review
"Inspired, funny but ultimately tragic look at colonialism in India. It has an unusual exuberence" (Mariella Frostrup INDEPENDENT ON SUNDAY )

"Had there been any justice, [this] should really have won this year's Booker of Bookers" (John Conolly IRISH TIMES )

"a darkly funny book, whose unsentimental, omniscient narrator scrutinises the self-delusions of the colonialists" (GUARDIAN )

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Customer Reviews

Stunning achievement
The Great Mutiny in 1857 has been a major inspiration for writers of fiction (and non-fiction too off course). Some of those fictional books I've read, though by far not all (has anyone read them all?), but never have I been as impressed by one as by `The siege of Krishnapur'.

This is really a most extraordinary book. I may perhaps not read it as people born and bred in England (to them Krishnapur is probably a household-name and a legendary part of their national history) but in fact this matters little. `The siege of Krishnapur' is much much more than a book about the siege of that particular place. The entire story is told from the point of view of a number of the English residents, while the sepoys are merely present as a part of the setting (almost as the summer heat, the monsoon rains, the bugs, ...). And it is in the description of these characters and their thoughts and feelings that this book surpasses all others I've read. Mr. Hopkins (the Collector), Mr. Willoughby (the Magistrate), George Fleury, Harry Dunstable, the Padre, and many more, will impress themselves upon you as if you know them in the flesh.

Their near-sighted views of most everything (the `civilizing' influence of British rule over India and science's progress, the roles of men versus women), their stubborn adherence to `proper' conduct and society's rules and regulations ever after 3 months of siege, the proverbial British phlegm in the face of desperate odds, it is all described with such an incomparable style and vocabulary to make these people both tragic, heroic, and - oddest perhaps of all - at times extremely humorous.

One of the best books I've read in years.

A rare vintage
Readers of fiction are herd animals, creatures of habit - we follow particular writers and we are reluctant to venture from them. But stray once to Farrell and the reader is richly rewarded for his intrepidness.

One of three works of fiction by J. G. Farrell which were together dubbed "The Empire Trilogy" for their colonial settings, The Siege of Krishnapur is masterful, though - I would argue - no more accomplished than the other two ("The Singapore Grip" and "Troubles") despite having won the Booker. Indeed, the fact it won the Booker is, if anything, misleading as to its merits, as the book does not conform with the norms for Booker winners: as one of the other reviewers observed, and if I may paraphrase him, Booker winning books are perceived by many to be overly dense, highly intellectual, and not particularly entertaining. In 'Krishnapur' Farrell's intellect remains firmly in the background, modestly concealed behind a captivating and charming ensemble of characters in an exotic and detailed setting. The result is always entertaining and never onerous.

It is a wise book too, rich with observations about human nature which the reader instinctively recognises and knows to be valid, though it remains positive to the end, and does not arrive at the gloomy conclusions which might have been provided by the setting of a starving garrison under siege. Instead, in 'Krishnapur' Farrell takes the opportunity to explore the different forms which courage, dignity, sacrifice and humour can take.

Another theme of this and his other books is an evident and profound affection for women. Never salacious or patronising, his characterisations of females are multifaceted, diverse, alluring and edifying. His biographer says he knew many women - certainly the richness of his observations upon the fairer sex evinces a life of long and careful observation. 'Krishnapur' was written in a more innocent age, before feminism in its more militant forms brought relations between the sexes to their present pitch of automatic suspiciousness, and it is unafraid to admire femininity and make a proper show of its unique charm.

Farrell was a master of 'never tell when you can show' and in consequence his writing is highly visual and evocative. Put simply, 'Krishnapur' is a superb account of how a group of people behave under appalling pressure, conveyed not in an intellectually self-conscious way, but by shrewd and telling demonstration.

Farrell was just emerging as a very important writer when he was drowned in 1979 while fishing off the coast of Ireland (some 29 Fastnet Race participants would also perish 24 hours later in the storm which killed Farrell). For those who have 'discovered' Farrell his death is an awful, awful pity. His published works - their small number particularly - stand as a sad reminder that a great talent was here struck down very prematurely. It is especially poignant that the book he was working on at the time of his death ("The Hill Station") was published incomplete. What could be more emblematic of a writing career abruptly interrupted?

"What a lot of Indian life was unavailable to Englishmen."
The bloody Siege of Krishnapur in 1857 is the pivot around which the action revolves in this Booker Award-winning novel by J. G. Farrell, but Farrell's focus is less on Krishnapur and the siege than it is on the attitudes and beliefs of the colonizers who made that siege an inevitability. He puts these empire-builders under the microscope, then skewers their arrogant and superior attitudes with the rapier of his wit, subjecting them to satire and juxtaposing them and their narrowly focused lives against the realities of the world around them. Remarkably, he does this with enough subtlety that we can recognize his characters as individuals, rather than total stereotypes, at the same time that we see their absurdity and recognize the damage they have done in their zeal to spread their "superior" culture.

From the opening pages, Farrell builds suspense as the Victorian colony ignores reports of unrest in Barrackpur, Berhampur, and Meerut. The flirtations of the single women, the amorous attentions of the young men, the boorish and insensitive behavior of the officials, the gossipy whispering of their wives, and the unrelenting efforts to maintain the same society they enjoyed at home--with tea parties, poetry readings, and dances--all attest to their degree of isolation from the world around them. When violence breaks out in Krishnapur and all the inhabitants take refuge in the colonial Residence, Farrell turns it into a microcosm which illuminates their misplaced values and goals as they interact with each other and face dangers from without--and from within. The siege continues for more than three months, with bloodshed, disease, starvation, lack of water and medicine, and the summer weather taking their toll.

Farrell's dark humor is unparalleled. Using irony, understatement, and a sense of the absurd, he conveys his disapproval of imperialism without resorting to the harshness of polemics. By concentrating exclusively on the inhabitants of the Residence and not on India's local population (ironically reflecting the approach of the colonizers themselves), he makes their behavior appear ridiculous in its own right, rather than ridiculous in comparison to other cultures. Mr. Rayne, the Opium Agent, calls the sale of opium, "progress." The Padre cannot understand why the Bible was originally written in an obscure language like Hebrew, rather than English, which is "spoken in every corner of every continent." A dying man offering up his last, heartfelt prayer is told by the Magistrate, "Yes, yes, to be sure, don't worry about it." The heads from a collection of small sculptures of the "great minds of Europe" are used as deadly explosives when shot becomes scarce.

Through his precise imagery, his acute eye for memorable and revealing details, his unerring ear for dialogue, his ability to maintain pace and suspense, and his humor, Farrell creates a historical novel with the enduring qualities which make it as relevant today as it was when published thirty years ago. Mary Whipple