I have always loved history, especially in the context of a particular city. But despite Kochi being my hometown, I must admit to complete ignorance on the place’s history. That’s why I was very excited about this book.
In about 4.5 sq km in Fort Kochi and Mattancherry, there are around 30 communities! This small area is also host to the social and religious institutions of these various communities. The variety of people and the origin stories are simply astounding. From Portugal and Yemen to Kutch and the Indus Valley, and many places in between, there have been migrations that happened decades and in some cases, even centuries ago, creating a mosaic of different cultures. A lot of credit goes to the traditional kings of Kochi who were generous with their grants to migrants. It has to be said that this has been repaid manifold by the benefits to trade and the economy in general. (more…)
What a fascinating read! The second world war was one of the most defining events of the contemporary era, and The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich provides a fantastic view of what happened in Germany between 1930 and 1945, chronicling the ascendance of Hitler and the Nazi Party and its eventual demise.
Hitler’s dream was to establish a Reich that would last a thousand years, though it finally managed just about a dozen. But in those few years, he managed to give the world the kind of shock it had probably never experienced before.
The book actually begins much earlier, and traces Hitler’s early life, his disenchantment with the socio-political environment prevalent in Austria and Germany, and his entry into regional politics. Through smart thinking, astute use of the economic depression, a lot of outmaneuvering of politicians far bigger in stature than him, and quite some luck, he took himself to a position where the nation was practically begging him to seize control. It is amazing to see the number of instances long before he gained power when a small change would have led to a different history than the one we are familiar with.
His baby steps into expanding Germany’s borders through cunning and then brute force, his affection for the largely ineffectual Mussolini, the poor judgment and horrendous miscalculations exhibited by the European powers, Stalin’s greed, all led to a state of affairs that made war inevitable. Germany dominated the early period, the Blitzkrieg tore through defenses, and it is astonishing to see how close they came to taking over all of Western Europe early in the war, in addition to Scandinavia and Eastern Europe. Through the mid to late 30s, what is also evident is Hitler’s own iron will, determination and political astuteness using which he outplayed his opponents over and over. But in Stalin, he met his match, and he underestimated the man and his country’s military strength. A costly mistake.
At some point, Hitler’s megalomania took over, and his downfall began. His allies, the Japanese, didn’t help the cause much by drawing the US into the war. He repeated history by disastrously opening two fronts in battle. He also misread the importance of North Africa and the Suez. But it is chilling to note that with a little patience and by sticking to strategic alliances, he might not have lost the war at all. The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich also covers the role played by several inept leaders of the German armed forces in bringing and keeping Hitler in power, and their inability to stand up to the dictator, even as they realised that he was leading their country into disaster. Also described in detail are the several plots that were hatched to assassinate Hitler, including Operation Valkyrie.
This is a commendable piece of work – not just for chronicling an important piece of history, but for the painstaking research that must have gone into it, and the control on a narrative with so many moving parts, all of which are important.
At 1100+ pages and the smallest possible font, The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich is not an easy read. But if you have any interest in history, and the war that shaped the modern world, this is a book you should definitely invest in.
Given that Ms.Roy is one of the authors, it is only fair to expect a fair amount of radical thought in the book. In just over a hundred pages, it does just that, helped by John Cusack, Edward Snowden and Daniel Ellsberg, who is described as the Snowden of the 60s.
The content is in the form of observations and conversations with one another. Arundhati Roy is in great form as she articulates thoughts that are not only profound but also vastly out of line with the propaganda that we are so familiar with. After all, even the resistance, as she says, has been quite domesticated. I found some of her observations quite astute. e.g. how “non violence is radical political theatre” and effective only when there is an audience. Or how “human rights are fundamental rights” and should be our minimum expectation, but they have become the maximum, whereas the goal really should be justice! My favourite though was on patriotism – how a country is just really an administrative unit but we end up giving it an esoteric meaning and protecting it with nuclear bombs! (more…)
Absolutely fantastic, and the strange thing is, if you had asked me when I was even at about page 400 (out of 555) I probably would have used milder adjectives. I also wouldn’t have thought (at that point) that I was likely to change my opinion later because knowing the direction, I didn’t think the last 100 or so pages would even be interesting to me. But while they’re not really the focus of the book, and more an inevitable ending, it (to me) is what delivered the texture that mattered most.
But let’s begin at the beginning. The focus of the book is definitely Maharani Sethu Lakshmi Bayi, who was the Regent of Travancore from 1924-31, but the author spends the first section of the book in setting the context. The canvas is vaster than Travancore itself and everything from the fall of the Zamorin and the entry of Europeans to the evolution of the intricacies that decide the ruler of the land and the prevalent socio cultural setting sets the stage for the reign of the Senior Maharani. (more…)
History is not usually kind on its readers, and changing that is probably the biggest advantage this book has to offer. The author makes history accessible through a largely simple narrative and writing style. While he has taught history, I don’t think he is a historian. Thus it isn’t based on what one might call ‘original research’ but more an aggregation of sources. Indeed, the book cites a large number of sources for the information it gives.
The ‘seeding’ begins long before humans arrived on the scene, when plate tectonics created the land mass that is now called the Indian subcontinent. The geological results – the Himalayas that act as a barrier, the fertility of the land etc – have had huge implications on how the civilisation in this part of the world has evolved.
The book moves on to the Indus Valley civilisation, the influx of the Aryans and the Rig Vedic times, the later Vedic times, and in the process, touching upon quite a few popular misconceptions. This entire shift is obviously significant from a civilisational and cultural point of view, but it is also interesting to see the theatre of action shift from the Indus to the Ganga. The societal and cultural milieu is also explained well, using the texts of the time – the Vedas and Upanishads. (more…)
