Gautam Chakravarty explores representations of the event which has become known in the British imagination as the 'Indian Mutiny' of 1857 in British popular fiction and historiography. Drawing on a wide range of primary sources including diaries, autobiographies and state papers, Chakravarty shows how narratives of the rebellion were inflected by the concerns of colonial policy and by the demands of imperial self-image. He goes on to discuss the wider context of British involvement in India from 1765 to the 1940s, and engages with constitutional debates, administrative measures, and the early nineteenth-century Anglo-Indian novel. Chakravarty approaches the mutiny from the perspectives of postcolonial theory as well as from historical and literary perspectives to show the extent to which the insurrection took hold of the popular imagination in both Britain and India. The book has a broad interdisciplinary appeal and will be of interest to scholars of English literature, British imperial history, modern Indian history and cultural studies.

Chakravarty explores representations of the Indian Mutiny of 1857 in British popular fiction and historiography.

About the Author
Gautam Chakravarty is Reader in the Department of English at the University of Delhi. He is the translator of Jibananananda Das, Short Fiction, 1931-1933 (2001), and has recently translated Kapalakundala by Bankim Chandra Chatterjee (2003).

Reviews
'... the book will have an appeal beyond literary scholars among historians and social anthropologists.' The Times Higher Education Supplement



Book Information
ISBN 9780521832748
Author Gautam Chakravarty
Format Hardback
Page Count 260
Imprint Cambridge University Press
Publisher Cambridge University Press
Weight(grams) 508g
Dimensions(mm) 235mm * 160mm * 26mm