The Soldier Scribe

[xl_target]

We have recently talked about several authors like Jim Corbett and Kenneth Anderson who have written about Shikar in India. There is another author who writes about India who is pretty high on my list, even though he doesn't write about Shikar all that much. He does write about the people of India and his descriptions of military life in India were always spot on. His most famous book, also a blockbuster Hollywood movie, at that time, was "Bhowani Junction", a story about the partition of India. "The Deceivers", dealing with Thugee was filmed in 1988 with Pierce Brosnan. Whoever wrote the Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom screenplay had surely read that story too.

He served as an Officer in the Gurkha Rifles. He fought in Iraq, Persia and Syria with his beloved Gurkha's and then with Wingate's chindits in Burma. A short while after he left India, John and his wife emigrated to the US. He later moved to Santa Fe, New Mexico and died there in 1983. While his characters, both Indian and English, were not always choir boys, I never ever got the feeling that the author depicted India or Indians in a bad light. To me he just seemed to tell it as he saw it. You could always tell that he had a soft spot for India and its people, though. His books are usually fast paced, adventure filled and usually left you with a good feeling when you were done. Wilbur Smith's Courtney and Ballantyne family epic's often remind me of this author's saga of the Savage family in India.

His name is Lt. Col. John Masters. Khushwant Singh said: "while Kipling understood India, John Masters understood Indians".

His Books:
Nightrunners of Bengal (1951)
The Deceivers (1952)
The Lotus and the Wind (1953)
Bhowani Junction (1954)
Coromandel! (1955)
Bugles and a Tiger (1956)
Far, Far the Mountain Peak (1957)
Fandango Rock (1959)
The Venus of Konpara (1960)
The Road Past Mandalay (1961)
To the Coral Strand (1962)
Trial at Monomoy (1964)
Fourteen Eighteen (1965)
The Breaking Strain (1967)
Casanova (1969)
The Rock (1970)
Pilgrim Son: A Personal Odyssey (1971)
The Ravi Lancers (1972)
Thunder at Sunset (1974)
The Field Marshal's Memoirs (1975)
The Himalayan Concerto (1976)
Now, God Be Thanked (1979)
Heart of War (1980)
By the Green of the Spring (1981)
Man of War (1983) - US Title 'High Command'

[hamiclar01]

....must say I was disappointed with Bhowani Junction.

and angry with the film version of the "Deceivers". If the book was similar, then he had it all wrong! These two titles ended my short affair with John Masters.

It must be me, but a most of the Indians in the two stories seemed caricatures (the bumbling nationalists and the evil cult members,) all set right by upright Britishers.

I can't say he matches Dalrymple's depth on India. But then, Dalrymple does not write fiction

[xl_target]

You can't judge a book by the movie. Let me assure you that the films are very shallow versions of the books.
Master is a reasonably good descriptive writer and you will see the story unfold as you read his books.

[rraju2805]

THANX A LOT , DEAR xl_target , for the info...

I AM VERY FOND OF READING STORY BOOKS..
I MUST COLLECT THOSE BOOK FROM LIBARY & READ THEM...
hope i should enjoy it..

WITH THANX & REGARDS
RAJU

[dr.jayakumar]

i wish i could read these.how come they haven't made much movies out of this?

[xl_target]

Please be aware that this is not light reading. If they will do nothing else, they will make you stop and question what you really know and that an issue can have many facets. This in no Flashmanesque romp through the countryside. His books can be very thought provoking. For example, the Nightrunners of Bengal is set during the mutiny and will challenge your stereotypical ideas about that conflict. It is no whitewashed, pure, "struggle for freedom" that they teach in the history books nowadays. It shows both sides of the conflicts and the inhumnaity and barbarism that accompanied that conflict. While fiction, most of the incidents portrayed have some basis in fact and can be backed up through research.
As far as The Decievers and evil cult members; Thugee did exist in India and was stamped out by the British. An estimate is that somewhere close to two million people were killed by them. Bufoonish politicians? There is no shortage of those, even today. The story does have a basis in fact. I never saw the movie but the book was engrossing. As for Bhowani Junction, I thought the movie was a little boring too.
Not all his books were written about India but I feel those that were, are worth reading. The Savage Family novels are written from a soldiers viewpoint. Masters says his characters do not reflect his viewpoint, they are just characters with human failings. What I always liked about Masters was that he didn't portray Indians under the Raj as inferior but just as people.

The Ravi Lancers was about an Indian Cavalry Regiment in WW1.

The following are his account of the saga of the Savage family in India; who helped build an empire and then watched it crumble away before their eyes:
Coromandel! (An English boy runs away to India).
The Deceivers (An English officer goes undercover to root out the ritual murders of Thuggee and is almost seduced by the powers of the dark side)
Nightrunners of Bengal (The Mutiny of 1857) - I was very young when i read this one and I was incensed at his portrayal of the Rani of Jhansi, who my history books had taught me was chaste, virginal and pure. Further research over the years has shown me that there might be an inkling of truth in how Masters portrayed her and her ministers. If anything it shows that there are no Angels anywhere on this earth, just humans.
The Lotus and the Wind (The Great Game of British and Russian spies on the Northwest Frontier).
Far, Far the Mountain Peak (Mountaineering and World War I). Another interest of mine. This book encouraged me to attend the Nehru Institute of Mountaineering at Uttarkashi and fostered an enduring love of the Himalayas
Bhowani Junction (Britain's exodus and the Partition of India).
To the Coral Strand ( The pain of some British Officers on having to leave India after Independence when they were not wanted in the Indian Army or the post war British Army.)
Reading them in sequence makes sense of the whole thing. The only thing I would say negative about his books is that he interjects sex in some places where they don't seem to add anything to the story. Not that his books are brimming with sex but his stories would have been good even without the sex. Keep in mind that these are noels and not history books.

Bugles and a Tiger and The Road To Mandalay were autobigraphical
Bugles and a Tiger - covers his graduation from Sandhurst to the beginning of WW2. It is a fascinating look at service in the NW Frontier and the life of a serving British officer in the Gurkha Rifles. A great read for those interested in soldiers of the Raj. If you read Kipling and liked him, You'll like this one. This is one of the better accounts of the Indian Army just prior to WW2. His love for the Gurkha soldier is clear and will give you some idea of why the Gurkha was such a formidable soldier in WW2. A must read if you are a student of Military History. it also shows you that fighting in Afghanistan, for most purposes, hasn't really changed much since then.
The Road to Mandalay - covers his WW2 years including service with the Chindits in Burma. It is much more brutal in the telling of pain, suffering and futility of war.

[essdee1972]

I have read Nightrunners of Bengal and The Road to Mandalay.

I found the British officer in the former using Hindi unprintable language far, far more believable than Brits speaking to each other in Brit accented Hindi as portrayed by Bollywood. And of course, the portrayal of the queen and the court was quite believable, if you know the history of those times. The queen, in spite of her peccadilloes, does come across as a very strong, almost fanatically patriotic lady. And of course, there are historical rumours of the Rani of Jhansi's affair with a Brit officer (portrayed as a "childhood friend" in the old Hindi version of "Jhansi ki Rani"). Let me say, I read the book not when I was a impressionable kid, but when I had turned into an Anglophile.

Even Khushwant Singh's Delhi notes the perversions and peccadilloes of the rulers of Delhi through the ages, things which you will never find in a NCERT textbook.

It is no whitewashed, pure, "struggle for freedom" that they teach in the history books nowadays. It shows both sides of the conflicts and the inhumnaity and barbarism that accompanied that conflict.

The problem is, we Indians are so brain-washed by our historians, that we can believe anything evil about Brits (and other foreigners) and nothing bad about Indians.

Well, I remain an unabashed Anglophile.

[hamiclar01]

You can't judge a book by the movie. Let me assure you that the films are very shallow versions of the books.
Master is a reasonably good descriptive writer and you will see the story unfold as you read his books.

Hmm, you tempt me sir. I might just have a go at the Deceivers then. Thugee was stamped out by an Englishman, though he mercifully did not have to go undercover.

Having said that, the latter's account (Thug: or a million murders, written not by him but by family) is also a full of praises of the great British Raj. I suppose if I were in government service, that's what I'd do. There were ample examples of misrule by Indians themselves.

NCERT textbooks are to provide a simplistic background, whitewashed albeit, to young people. Most of them find history boring anyway. They are not there to form opinions of history or historians on.

Neither IMHO are works of fiction.

A big reason for the caricature of English as evil and arrogant, in the opinion of Indians (which still persists) were provided by the former themselves. There was a gradual hardening of stance and a holier than thou/evanglical attitude that developed among the resident Englishmen and women around the end of the 18th and beginning of the 19th century, against the heathen they were ruling. This was a far cry from the White Mughals and Frasers of the past who appreciated and intermingled with Indians as equals.

What you sow is what you reap. This change of stance eventually not only brought in the conflict of 1857 (it became easier to believe the beef/pork grease theory), but fore ever alienated the British from the minds of the common Indian.

"..when I was a Sepoy the captain of my company would have some men at his house all day and he talked with them.....many officers nowadays only speak to their men when obliged to do so, and they show that the business is irksome and try to get rid of the sepoys as quickly as possible."
Sitaram Pandey ,"From Sepoy to Subedar", 1873

[rraju2805]

sir,
I wil try my best. I already give the list to my uncle to bring those books from NATIONAL LIBERY...
I HOPE I COMPLETE IT.

With regards
raju

[timmy]

XL, you make a powerful case for picking up one of these books and giving it a go. I confess that I am quite a bit like hamiclar, it seems, generally preferring footnoted historical studies to novels, but on rare occasions, I have been tempted to jump the fence into fiction.

Right now, my book pile has taken on a matterhorn profile, so I can't commit to getting around to anything soon, but I do appreciate this conversation and the ideas it has put forth.

As a neophyte to Indian history, I enter with some background into Mexican history, which is a colonial story about a clash of empires and the subduction of one by the other. Moral judgments fly fast and thick in discussions of this subject, as well: for instance, the discussion of Thugees and their suppression by the British might evoke a comparison with the Aztec sacrificial system, and its suppression by the Spanish.

Regarding the Rani of Jhansi, is a curious thing, how people often want their heroes pure and tend to whitewash accounts to square away their idealized notions with the historical facts. I note 2 things here:

1. In the USA, it is beyond doubt that Martin Luther King, the great civil rights leader who took a page from Gandhi and brought a nation to face its evil side, was an adulterer. Apparently, his practice of this was regular. However, I don't think that this is what is noteworthy about him. Adulterers are seldom in shortage, but someone with the willingness to challenge deeply held bigotry at the risk of one's life is, particularly with the deep thought that MLK put behind his actions in the civil rights movement. In other words, his adultery, which to me is personally repugnant and, regarding King's position as a minister of religion, hypocritical, still does not diminish his contribution to America and bringing it closer to realizing its ideal.

2. I have a close friend who has been guiding me in my cultural tastes, especially in the area of Bollywood and Kollywood. (In return, I've been trying to inculcate in her a love for classic movies, like Casablanca and Rebecca.) In this conversation, I was telling her about Merle Oberon after watching The Scarlett Pimpernel. There's no doubt that Oberon was a woman of the world, and did what she saw fit to achieve what she wanted. This doesn't take away (at least, for me) from her artistic achievements or her screen radiance (which was considerable).

My Dad, I guess, passed on a curious legacy to me: he did not teach me to have heroes. This has allowed me to be interested in a great number of people, and profit from the lessons of what they did well, as well as from when they were found lacking.

This is a long way of saying that, whatever the Rani of Jhansi's personal amours might have been, her achievement ultimately bore fruit and she's recognized for her efforts. There is a justice in this, I think.

Anglophile/Anglophobe: The "hero" thing extends into cultural appreciation for me, as well. I am fascinated by the British, partly because of their stupendous achievements, and partly because I see the USA as following a historical path similar to the British Empire, with a difference of 100 years. I do marvel at how many times the British leaders moved in the right direction.

However, I also note this: In the 17th Century, India was perhaps the wealthiest civilization on earth, if one adds the Mughal Empire with other independent states. Trade and productivity flourished. By the time I was a child in the late 50s, the word "India" was synonymous with the most abject poverty and backwardness that could be imagined. Whether or not this was completely true, it is the image held by Americans at the time.

A someone who is interested in naval history and ships from an early age, I marveled at the descriptions of Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee, where rows upon rows of battleships stretch in lines miles long -- battleships that were perhaps the single most complex thing made by man at that time. Where did Great Britain get the wealth to build a fleet of over 50 predreadnoughts, and then turn around and build a second fleet of dreadnoughts within a decade?

This single illustration alone gives a glimpse into the vast amount of wealth the British extracted from India -- A figure that must be almost beyond comprehension. Colonial powers were incredibly rapacious in the late 19th Century. (For instance, the USA took more wealth out of Mexico in the 30 years of Porfirio Diaz than the Spanish could manage in 300!) Could inflicting this sort of grinding poverty be an agreeable price for, say, the railroads? Was the imposition of the coolie system that replaced the outlawing of slavery, with folks transported to Australia, Fiji, and British Guyana (to name a few places) compensated for fully by the legacy of the Civil Service?

For me, it is much easier to say that what was good, was good, and what was bad, was bad, rather than trying to adhere to an ideology (or hagiography) of heroes.

Perhaps I'm on thin ice here, but this approach to leading figures and nations has enabled me to see how, for instance, Nehru was truly a great man in the legacy that he bequeathed to India, despite his denouncing Suez, while rationalizing bolshevik tanks in Budapest, or in his support for Krishna Menon leading up to the 1962 War.

Well, gentlemen, I have most likely overstayed my welcome on this thread (which seemed pretty quiet by the time I felt it safe to make this post). I hope you will forgive my impudence for venturing to make these remarks and accept my thanks for this conversation.

PS: XL, I'm saving your remarks on Masters' works -- the time will hopefully come to crack the cover of one!

[winnie_the_pooh]

XL,
Thanks for the list.

For an iconoclastic view of Gandhi

http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-enter ... 37411.html

[nagarifle]

must confess i do not remember reading any of the masters books. have to get one,

one i was a school kid we had to read fiction "old mali and the boy" worth reading this, a hunting trip gone wrong, sorry for going of the subject.

[Vikram]

XL, I never read the books you suggested.I will try to get hold of some if that is possible where I am now.

Tim,

Your scholarship and grasp of Indian history would put many to shame.Excellent post.


Best-
Vikram

[xl_target]

Guys,
It has been many years since I have read Masters. My mother had several of his novels in her library which I read when I was still back in India. I only have one book of his in my personal library and that it the "Road to Mandalay". I tend to read a lot of historical books too with a special emphasis on WW2 so it fits right in. I did come across some of his books in the public library too.
After posting this post, I decided to see if I could pick up some more of his books to re-read. While he was very popular in the 50's and 60's, it seems that it is going to be hard to find his books now. I did see some used copies on Amazon but most of them have been out of print for quite a few years.

I would like to apologize for getting people all fired up about this author, especially if they are not going to be able to locate his books.
However, if you do find his books, you might be pleasantly surprised.

Esdee, Timmy, Hami, Winnie,
We should start threads on some of the subjects raised here like Colonialism and its effects or Britain's sea power and its effects. I'm sure they would be fascinating discussions to read.

[shooter]

An interesting thread.
Very interesting views.
WTP again as usual scores with interesting links.
XL shows how bongs will always be philosophical thanks to 'adda' culture.
Hamiclar one of the most well read, intelligent people i have come across.
Timmy always sharing his infinite knowledge and openness to other cultures.

Hope there are more like this one.