'I had read only a few pages of Inglorious Empire before I thought, "What a wonderful book this would be to teach from." It's witty and fast-paced, the what-ifs and what-might-have-beens set up to provoke discussion.
Essential for a Britain lost in sepia fantasies about its past, Inglorious Empire is history at its clearest and cutting best.' -Ben Judah, author of This Is London
In this bold and incisive reassessment of colonialism, Tharoor exposes to devastating effect the inglorious reality of Britain's stained Indian legacy. He goes on to show how Britain's Industrial Revolution was founded on India's deindustrialisation, and the destruction of its textile industry. Beyond conquest and deception, the Empire blew rebels from cannon, massacred unarmed protesters, entrenched institutionalised racism, and caused millions to die from starvation.īritish imperialism justified itself as enlightened despotism for the benefit of the governed, but Shashi Tharoor takes on and demolishes this position, demonstrating how every supposed imperial 'gift' - from the railways to the rule of law - was designed in Britain's interests alone. By 1947, after two centuries of British rule, it had decreased six-fold. In the eighteenth century, India's share of the world economy was as large as Europe's. Inglorious Empire tells the real story of the British in India - from the arrival of the East India Company to the end of the Raj - and reveals how Britain's rise was built upon its plunder of India.
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