Reviews for Village work in India

The average rating for Village work in India based on 2 reviews is 4 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2011-12-19 00:00:00 Thomas Christenson Emily Eden was the seventh daughter of Baron Auckland, one of her descendants was Anthony Eden, the Tory prime minister. Her brother George was the Governor-General of India from 1835-1842; he was responsible for the First Afghan War (1838-1842), which was a total disaster and the start of European meddling which still goes on. Emily and her sister Fanny accompanied George and Emily kept a journal which she sent in letter form to another sister in England. This virago volume covers the period from October 1837 to 1840 when George went on tour in the upper provinces meeting local rulers and potentates with a caravan of staff, followers and soldiers which often numbered up to 20,000 people. The book is extracts form Emily’s journal/letters of this tour. It is an interesting look at life in the English upper classes in India before the mutiny and before Victoria was proclaimed Empress. Eden is an artist and sketcher as well, so she has good descriptive powers and spent a good deal of time looking for scenes, architecture and ruins to sketch. There is little political analysis as this didn’t interest Eden, she was entirely uncritical of her brother: there is though plenty of gossip and descriptions of what Eden saw as the oddness of local rulers. Social functions, durbars, balls and the like are covered in detail as is the interminable exchange of presents when they meet another local ruler. Her brother’s prosecution of the war is not covered and it wasn’t until 1858 when it was discovered that the beloved George had totally misrepresented the case against Dost Muhammed Khan, the incumbent ruler in Kabul. The daily movement of the caravan across the plains and into the hills is described in detail as is the climate: the heat of the plains and the much milder hill country. Eden is quite witty about those around her and has quite a sharp tongue and seems to matchmake quite a bit (she never married). Eden also spends quite a lot of time waiting for letters and news from home and for the latest Dickens instalment. Pickwick Papers and Oliver Twist are mentioned. All this is very well and illuminates a life and times long gone (thankfully). There are also however relationships and interactions with Indian servants and the local population. Whilst I am sure there were much worse examples of the British in India, Eden appears fond of most of her servants. Her feelings are based on a sense of superiority and an underlying contempt. At one point Eden noticed a mother with a starving child (there are occasional hints of famines). For a couple of days this has novelty value and Eden speaks of providing food and support; then she seems to get bored and there is no further mention of the child. There are periodic oddities when they come across ex-soldiers or members of the British community who have taken on local culture and married local women: Eden struggles to know what to make of them. Eden often writes of missing England and disliking India. She doesn’t want to be there, but it doesn’t occur to her that she (and the rest of the British) shouldn’t be there.

Review # 2 was written on 2013-11-30 00:00:00 Kathy Sassa These journal letters of Emily Eden re-creates a world for us now, that has of course completely disappeared. All the small domestic goings on you might expect of a Governor-General's camp, as they travel the country of India, servant punishments, visits to Maharajas, the heat, the disappointment of letters having not arrived. Delightfully there are many which the reader might not have expected also, a pet squirrel, a shawl obession, the purchase of a couple of orphans, the painting of a picture of the young Queen Victoria whom E E had never seen, to present to a Maharaja. Emily Eden is witty, intelligent and sharp, her observations of people and places brilliantly acute. I find it wonderful really that a middle aged lady in 1838 could sit under canvas writing her journal letters home to England, and that I now all these years later can read about the peculiar converstaion she has just had with an indian servant, and how she longs for England. Thank goodness people like Emily Eden had the foresight to write and publsih such things, for without them, us readers wouldn't get to visit half the places we do.