The Classics and Colonial India (Classical Presences) - Tapa dura

This is a gold-mine of a book, that treats a fascinating subject with all the intelligent imagination, based on exhaustive research, that it so richly deserves. (Professor Peter Green, Adjunct Professor at the University of Iowa)

This is a book which significantly deepens our understanding of how classics could exert an influence in a colonial context ... All in all, and most importantly, while this book answers many important questions, it also provides a wealth of evidence to support future research into the nature of the relationship between the classics and empire. It is of undoubted value to scholars specializing in the field of classical reception, classical studies more broadly, and wider audiences interested in the history of classical scholarship and modern intellectual history in a colonial context. (The Classical Journal)

This extraordinary book provides a detailed account of the relationship between classical antiquity and the British colonial presence in India. It examines some of the great figures of the colonial period such as Gandhi, Nehru, Macaulay, Jowett, and William Jones, and covers a range of different disciplines as it sweeps from the eighteenth century to the end of the British Raj in the twentieth.

Using a variety of materials, including archival documents and familiar texts, Vasunia shows how classical culture pervaded the thoughts and minds of the British colonizers. His book highlights the many Indian receptions of Greco-Roman antiquity and analyses how Indians turned to ancient Greece and Rome during the colonial period for a variety of purposes, including anti-colonialism, nationalism, and collaboration.

Offering a unique cross-cultural study, this volume will be of interest to literary scholars and historians of the classical world, the British Empire, and South Asia.