Posts tagged Luang Prabang
Books and novels are an inevitable part of the backpacker’s luggage allowance. In some cases, taking a few hours to read presents the opportunity of transporting one’s thoughts and focus away from the immediate environment. However, due to the nature of the backpacker and the endeavour that they set out upon, that is not so likely to be the case. More often that not, it is the environment that creates the perfect opportunity to sit and dwell on what one is reading.
I have been reading William Dalrymple’s ‘The Last Mughal’ rather intently since arriving in Laos. A combination of gorgeous mountain views, a relaxing environment and an 23:30 curfew in Nong Kheaw made for more than ample reading time and I seem to have raced through the book in a few days.
The author tells the story of the Emperor Zafar (1775 - 1862), the Mughal’s relationship with the British and the city of Delhi shortly before and after the sepoy rebellion of 1857, which saw the deaths of thousands of people and the absolute destruction of one of the most fascinating cities that ever was. Through citations and references gathered from archives in London, India and Myanmar. Dalrymple has created a truly remarkable account of Delhi life and society in the 19th Century as well as an explanation of the often frightening and extreme diplomatic engagements between the British and the Mughals.
A very crude outline of the story is as follows. The British recruited thousands upon thousands of Muslim, High Caste Hindu and, crucially, Sikh soldiers during their advances across Asia. The Empire provided a basic salary, training and shelter for the soldiers as they moved from place to place with their imperialist agenda, allowing for law and order to be maintained in each city and province as they did so. Due to a lack of cultural understanding, the Hindus soldiers were subjected to performing military tasks that went deeply against the grain of their religion and they rebelled. There were a range of tasks in particular that sparked this rebellion, but the main cause, it seems, involved biting cartridges that were greased with cow products in order to load their weaponry. Cows are of course considered sacred in the Hindu religion and so it is no wonder that there was a negative reaction. Groups of soldiers, or sepoys, began to rebel without the driving force of a military leader, or indeed an immediate plan, and they began butchering the British Men, women and children who resided in the capital and the surrounding areas. The rebels then advanced to the Red Fort in Delhi where they asked for the blessing of Zafar so as to legitimise their acts of violence. Muslims and Jihadis also joined in with the proceedings, emphasising that it was time for the Mughal Empire to reclaim its preponderance over the British and to rid India of all the Christians who had moved there.
The story delves deep into the lives and the thoughts of its characters in accordance with their diary entries and correspondences. Most intriguing are that of Theo Metcalfe, who swears the most brutal revenge when his friends and family are butchered by the sepoy rebels; Zinat Mehal Begum, the Emperor’s favourite wife who plots and schemes with the most sharp and tender cunning; Ghalib the Poet, a wonderfully talented Urdu wordsmith and commentator and also one of the few Muslim survivors of Delhi after it is rampaged by the British; The Reverend Midgely John Jennings, a crafty religious fanatic intent on converting as many people as possible to Christianity; Harriet Tytler, the wife of a British soldier who ends up giving birth in a cart during the British siege; John Nicolson, a heroic brute of magnificent proportion who insights little but inspiration and fear in his fellow Englishmen; and The Emperor Bahadur Shah Zafar II himself, a timid and intelligent Emperor who clearly finds himself in the wrong place at the wrong time.
Through the words of these choice characters and of those around them, it becomes apparent that the form of revenge the British chose to take was typically ghastly. They ensured their share of barbaric carnage after taking the city of Delhi by force in September 1857. The degree of intolerance and ignorance displayed by both sides of the rebellion are disappointing to say the least. What Dalrymple is able to achieve however is a positive insight as to how these errs might be avoided in the future as he points to the current situation in India and Pakistan as well as the Middle East.
I tried to imagine Dalrymple in Delhi as young man, formulating his apparent bond with India and its past. The man clearly has a love for the country and its history and I wish to learn more from this fantastic scholar. As it happens, I stumbled upon a bookshop today in Luan Prabang and found a copy of one of his first book, entitled ‘In Xanadu’. Tomorrow I shall try and exchange my copy of ‘The Last Mughal’ for this earlier title and continue with my reading escapades in the sweet serenity of the fantastic landscape that seems to surround every settlement in this wonderful country of Laos.
