INDIAN SUMMER, Alex von Tunzelmann: The Secret History of the End of an Empire [Paperback] Alex Von Tunzelmann Paperback – 1 January 2017

The level of research packed in this book is just extraordinary. I was pleasantly surprised. A brilliant analysis of the last years of the Raj in India with reference to 5 key players: Nehru, Gandhi, Jinnah and Dickie and Edwina Mountbatten. Those of us who now think of Nehru as a foolish, naive idealist will be surprised to find out how much of a pragmatist he was in comparison to Gandhi. Yes, the Nehru-Edwina love affair was real, and the book gives a no-holds barred account of their closeness. Nevertheless, it refuses to judge these individuals from a specific ideological standpoint, British or Indian. In the process, it reveals their humanity and these momentous personalities become so much like us. A masterpiece!

“In the beginning, there were two nations. One was a vast, mighty and magnificent empire, brilliantly organized and culturally unified, which dominated a massive swathe of the earth. The other was an undeveloped, semi-feudal realm, riven by religious factionalism and barely able to feed its illiterate, diseased and stinking masses. The first nation was India. The second was England.”This is the how the young historian Alex von Tunzelmann begins the first chapter of her first book, “Indian Summer”. This book contains 464 pages including notes, bibliography, glossary and index. The main text is divided into four sections, titled “Empire”, “The End”, “The Beginning” and “Afterwards”.Note that “The Beginning” comes after “The End” – and read on for more surprises!The first section presents an overview of Indian history from the first English envoy reaching the court of Akbar the Great in 1577 to the appointment of Lord Mountbatten as the Viceroy of India in March 1947. It is not easy to compress 370 years into 146 pages, especially when author provides a wealth of biographical detail, such as –“Motilal Nehru was a colossus, of broad shoulder and imposing countenance. It was often remarked that, in profile, he resembled a Roman emperor.”“Whatever his moral eccentricities and political failures, Gandhi’s charm and charisma ensured that he remained popular both within Congress and the nation at large. The millions of admirers he attracted from among the general public greeted him not as a politician, but as a spiritual guru.”“And the most pig-headed of all British politicians when it came to India was Winston Churchill...”“…Jinnah was no fundamentalist. His Islam was liberal, moderate and tolerant. It was said that he could recite none of the Koran, rarely went to a mosque, and spoke little Urdu.”There is a photograph by Henri Cartier-Bresson on the cover of this book, which shows Nehru enjoying a joke with Edwina Mountbatten - while her husband looks straight into the camera with an impassive expression. Despite the subtitle “The Secret History of the End of an Empire”, the book does not expose any state secrets – instead, it mostly presents interconnected biographies of the key players indicated by the cover picture.The second section focuses on the four-month period from the arrival of the Mountbattens in India in March 1947 to the historic independence and the tragic partition in mid-August. The third section describes the early history of independent India (justifying the “Beginning” coming after the “End” of the British Raj). These two sections, which present much of the painstaking research carried out by the author, constitute the core of the book.“While Edwina began to find her footing,” a week after their arrival in India, “Dickie rapidly lost his.” The author praises Lady Mountbatten for “crouching down to talk face to face with refugee women, establishing an informality that was a departure from the style of previous vicereines.” She charmed Mahatma Gandhi and visited him frequently, saying that he was the most wonderful man she had ever met. Eventually, “Edwina coordinated fifteen separate relief organizations, two government ministries and one Mahatma into a single targeted team with clear instructions and purpose.”As for “Dickie” Mountbatten, we had already learnt about his “great gift for storytelling, unspoilt by any preoccupation with the truth” and “infatuation with orders and rank”. We had also been told about his royal ancestry, his unconventional marriage and the blunders of his naval career. Now we learn that “Mountbatten’s initial meeting with Gandhi had been bad. His meetings with Jinnah would be worse.” Yet, the author strongly defends Mountbatten’s numerous failures in India – including mishandling of the Sikhs, lack of British Army support and the speed of the transfer of power – resulting in mass migrations and the death of lakhs of people consequent to the partition. She also highlights Mountbatten’s supportive role in Sardar Patel’s mission of integration of princely states into India.There are many references to the close friendship between Pandit Nehru and Lady Mountbatten. “They were known to be close, and they were known to have political influence with each other.” They spent much time together and she was able to persuade him that India should become a Dominion until the new Constitution came into force. However, when it comes to “the rumours of a roaring love affair”, the author admits that she was not given access to the letters they had written to each other – and she wisely refrains from coming to any scandalous conclusions!This book contains a small, but select collection of photographs – including one discovered by the author, in which Nehru is clutching Edwina’s hand while they are walking away from a seemingly hostile crowd in a refugee camp. It seems remarkable that the Prime Minister and the wife of the Governor General visited such crowded places with so little security in those days.While the narration is smooth, the author adopts a rather jarring style of referring to many people in the book by their informal names – so Nehru’s sisters Vijaya Lakshmi (Pandit) and Krishna (Hutheesing) appear as “Nan” and “Betty” respectively. Similarly, Louis Mountbatten’s name is abbreviated as “DM” instead of “LM”.There is a short glossary explaining terms which might be unfamiliar to readers outside India, but this needs much improvement. For instance, it defines “kurta” as “a long shirt worn over trousers” while unnecessarily adding “The women’s version is the kurti”! In fact, kurti has various shades of meaning – it can be a short kurta worn by either gender, a feminine blouse or a soldier’s tunic (archaic).Despite such shortcomings, this is a monumental work, comparable to “Freedom at Midnight” by Larry Collins and Dominique Lapierre. It is hard to believe that this is von Tunzelmann’s first book, published when she was just thirty. It is even more difficult to believe – as the author confesses in the Introduction she added in the 2017 edition – that she had not visited India till she began writing this book.

It's one of the most engaging and enthralling book on Indian history and independence that I have read in a long time! I'm not of information which was headed to unknown to me was revealed through the pages.not only did this book depict the events and inside details of those times but dealt with almost all the personalities on a very close level.I highly recommend this book to everyone who wants to know the inside and headed to unknown truth about the Indian history.in fact, after the book was over, I was left with a deep sense of sorrow because I wondered, what would I do going forward!Thank you very much for writing such an insightful creation!

I thoroughly enjoyed reading the book by Alex Von Tunzelmann.She has researched the book well as evidenced by the numerous references throughout the book.The book focuses on 4 main characters:Mountbatten including Edwina,Nehru, Gandhi and Jinnah.It is about Indian History but reads like a novel!!

A great book is one that keeps you captive even after you finish it and place in shelve.I am delighted that I have just finished another book that I will love to pass on to my grand children before my death.Another book on Indian partition was not needed as I thought while ordering it but once I started my journey with this book a month ago I immediately recemented my love with the subject.Alex Von Tunzelmann in her this book have opened all those secret chambers of history which were never opened before.The saga and gambit of partition that changed lives of millions in Punjab, Bengal, Sindh and Assam was re painted in all new colors with loads of new information.The perfect analysis of Neheru- Edwina secret relation with many new nuggets, the barter of Gurdaspur and Firozpur of Punjab in exchange of Chittagong of Bengal , Patel Neheru clash over Hydrabad and Kashmir, the all secret deals and leakage of papers in Shimla, Md Ali Jinha's pathetic end in isolation, no islamic fanatism beneficial to encash found in Kashmir by Muslim Leauge leaders and Neheru's statesmanship with poor future outlook all were given new lights by this historian from Oxford.Thank you Alex.You have made my personal library richer and have added a new rainbow in my passion of knowing Indian partition as a subject.