He won the third one in 1970 for Troubles, and the sixth in 1973 for The Siege of Krishnapur. Farrell was the first writer to win two Booker Prizes. I'm reading all the Booker Prize winners this year. This is the second book in his Empire Trilogy. Based on historical events, Farrell does an incredible job with the writing and the story-telling. I like how the tension grows in the story to an almost unbearable pitch and the subtle humor, that permeates the first half of the novel slowly begins to crumble. The colonists start to prepare for an attack but they are soon surrounded and the siege begins. There are are hints and rumblings that an uprising is about to occur, by Muslim soldiers. The British here are living a comfortable life, clutching to their noble, old-world principles. An isolated British outpost, on the subcontinent. Even Justice, Science, and Respectability.” “All our actions and intentions are futile unless animated by warmth of feeling. “India itself was now a different place the fiction of happy natives being led forward along the road to civilization could no longer be sustained.” All our reforms of administration might be reforms on the moon for all it has to do with them.” “The British could leave and half India wouldn't notice us leaving just as they didn't notice us arriving.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |