The Memsahibs
The Memsahibs

Author: Pat Barr

Publisher: Faber & Faber

Published: 2011-05-19

Total Pages: 234

ISBN-13: 0571279104

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Thousands of British women lived in India during Victorian times. They first went out as wives, mothers, sisters; others followed as teachers, doctors, missionaries. What they did and how they responded to their strange environment were seldom thought worthy of record, and writers have handed down to us a fictional image of the typical 'memsahib' as a frivolous, snobbish and selfish creature flitting from bridge to tennis parties 'in the hills'. For the most part, these clichés bear little resemblance to the truth; many women loyally and stoically accepted their share of the responsibility with endurance, courage and resilience. This story is developed around a number of women who wrote in an entertaining and intelligent fashion about their Indian experiences, starting with the arrival on the scene of one of the wittiest and cleverest of them all - Emily Eden, sister of Lord Auckland who was Governor-General from 1836 to 1842. It ends with Maud Diver, who maintained that the random assertion made by Kipling about the 'lower tone of social morality' in India was unjust and untrue. The dramatis personae of the book include Vicereines, wives of Civil Servants and missionaries struggling to break down the subservience of women throughout the vast sub-continent. Through women's eyes we witness the principal historic events at the time - the Afghan conflicts, the Mutiny - as well as the daily routines in very different cantonments and some of the British personalities who made their mark on nineteenth-century India - Honoria Lawrence, Flora Steel, Lady Sale. In this vivid account, Pat Barr evokes the sights and smells of Victorian India, its teeming masses, its problems so impossible, it seemed, for Englishwomen to solve.

Memsahibs Abroad
Memsahibs Abroad

Author: Indira Ghose

Publisher:

Published: 1998

Total Pages: 324

ISBN-13:

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This exciting anthology provides the best of travel writing by the memsahibs of the Raj who were anxious to see `the real India'. The book salvages long-forgotten writings by Englishwomen travelling in India. These historically valuable writings are perceptive and amusing, and have long been out of print. It also contains biographical notes on the travellers.

The Memsahib's Cookbook
The Memsahib's Cookbook

Author: Rhona Aitken

Publisher: Piatkus Books

Published: 1989

Total Pages: 128

ISBN-13: 9780861888856

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Evoking the lost world of the memsahibs and their households, this book consists of a collection of the popular Anglo-Indian recipes they devised during the 19th and early-20th centuries, updated for cooking today. They are accompanied by the writings of the Bombay-born Edward Hamilton Aitken.

Memsahibs
Memsahibs

Author: Ipshita Nath

Publisher: Hurst Publishers

Published: 2022-06-16

Total Pages: 454

ISBN-13: 1787388786

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For young Englishwomen stepping off the steamer, the sights and sounds of humid colonial India were like nothing they’d ever experienced. For many, this was the ultimate destination to find a perfect civil servant husband. For still more, however, India offered a chance to fling off the shackles of Victorian social mores. The word ‘memsahib’ conjures up visions of silly aristocrats, well-staffed bungalows and languorous days at the club. Yet these women had sought out the uncertainties of life in Britain’s largest, busiest colony. Memsahibs introduces readers to the likes of Flora Annie Steel, Fanny Parks and Emily Eden, accompanying their husbands on expeditions, travelling solo across dangerous terrain, engaging with political questions, and recording their experiences. Yet the Raj was not all adventure. There was disease, and great risk to young women travelling alone; for colonial wives in far-flung outposts, there was little access to ‘society’. Cut off from modernity and the Western world, many women suffered terrible trauma and depression. From the hill-stations to the capital, this is a sweeping, vividly written anthology of colonial women’s lives across British India. Their honesty and bravery, in their actions and their writings, shine fresh light on this historical world.

Women of the Raj
Women of the Raj

Author: Margaret MacMillan

Publisher: Random House Trade Paperbacks

Published: 2007-10-09

Total Pages: 394

ISBN-13: 0812976398

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In the nineteenth century, at the height of colonialism, the British ruled India under a government known as the Raj. British men and women left their homes and traveled to this mysterious, beautiful country–where they attempted to replicate their own society. In this fascinating portrait, Margaret MacMillan examines the hidden lives of the women who supported their husbands’ conquests–and in turn supported the Raj, often behind the scenes and out of the history books. Enduring heartbreaking separations from their families, these women had no choice but to adapt to their strange new home, where they were treated with incredible deference by the natives but found little that was familiar. The women of the Raj learned to cope with the harsh Indian climate and ward off endemic diseases; they were forced to make their own entertainment–through games, balls, and theatrics–and quickly learned to abide by the deeply ingrained Anglo-Indian love of hierarchy. Weaving interviews, letters, and memoirs with a stunning selection of illustrations, MacMillan presents a vivid cultural and social history of the daughters, sisters, mothers, and wives of the men at the center of a daring imperialist experiment–and reveals India in all its richness and vitality. “A marvellous book . . . [Women of the Raj] successfully [re-creates] a vanished world that continues to hold a fascination long after the sun has set on the British empire.” –The Globe and Mail “MacMillan has that essential quality of the historian, a narrative gift.” –The Daily Telegraph “MacMillan is a superb writer who can bring history to life.” –The Philadelphia Inquirer “Well researched and thoroughly enjoyable.” –Evening Standard

The Compassionate Memsahibs
The Compassionate Memsahibs

Author: Mary Ann Lind

Publisher: Praeger

Published: 1988-04-27

Total Pages: 160

ISBN-13:

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The Compassionate Memsahibs refutes the traditional view--perpetuated in the works of writers like Rudyard Kipling--of the memsahibs as a homogeneous group of aloof, pampered women who had little interest in India. Here Mary Ann Lind presents information about the lives of fifteen memsahibs--all of which is previously unpublished--who voluntarily participated in reform and welfare activities in India during the first half of this century. Their activities and experiences placed them outside the more expected lifestyle of the memsahib and offer contemporary social historians a new window through which to view the Raj.