Secondly, there is the edifying devotion to detail, something that historians have abandoned in the quest for theory. First, there is the lucidity of style and the striking absence of jargon-the bane of the social sciences. In terms of historiography, the importance of this book can't be underestimated. Through the Bhawal case, Chatterjee encapsulates the last 50 years of colonial rule. Projecting his endeavour as a "narrative history", he tells the story at various levels-as a thriller involving mystery, conspiracy, deceit and courtroom drama as a commentary on upper-class Bengali bhadralok society as a study of a legal system where exacting standards of advocacy coexisted with shameless perjury and as a study of the complex power relations between a colonial officialdom obsessed with law and order and "native" society. Partha Chatterjee's reconstruction of the Bhawal sadhu case is masterly. ROYAL TIES: The Mejo Kumar of Bhawal proved an excessive draw in Bengal for 25 years
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |