India + Indian history

Book Reviews

Zahiruddin Babur: The Baburnama
Memoirs of Babur, Prince and Emperor
Susan Bayly: Caste, Society and Politics in India*
From the Eighteenth Century to the Modern Age
Roberto Calasso: Ka**
- a superb synthesis of Hindu mythology
K.N. Chaudhuri: Trade and Civilisation in the Indian Ocean*
An Economic History from the Rise of Islam to 1750
Fred W. Clothey: Religion in India: A Historical Introduction
- straightforward and accessible
Wendy Doniger: The Hindus: An Alternative History
- down-to-earth and magisterial
Richard G. Fox: Gandhian Utopia: Experiments with Culture
- did Gandhi matter? can individuals change history?
Rob Jenkins: Democratic Politics and Economic Reform in India
- the persistence of liberal economic reform in the 1990s
D.N. Jha: The Myth of the Holy Cow
- the origins of cow veneration and vegetarianism in India
John Keay: The Great Arc
The Dramatic Tale of How India Was Mapped and Everest Was Named
Rudyard Kipling: Kipling Stories
Twenty-eight Exciting Tales by the Master Storyteller
James W. Laine: Shivaji
Hindu King in Islamic India
Oliver Mendelsohn, Marika Vicziany: The Untouchables
Subordination, Poverty and the State in Modern India
Pankaj Mishra: An End to Suffering
The Buddha in the World
R.K. Narayan: The Mahabharata; The Ramayana
- an accessible English abridgment
Andrew Robinson: The Indus
- a mysterious "lost" civilisation
Tansen Sen: Buddhism, Diplomacy, and Trade
The Realignment of Sino-Indian Relations, 600-1400
Khushwant Singh: Train to Pakistan*
- one of the classic novels of Partition
Romila Thapar: Early India
From the Origins to AD 1300
Valmik Thapar: Land of the Tiger
A Natural History of the Indian Subcontinent
David Zurick, P.P. Karan: Himalaya
Life on the Edge of the World

See also: China | Pakistan | Southeast Asia

In 1998 I spent three weeks in India, visiting Maharashtra and Rajasthan as part of a community leadership program, and would like to go back and see more.