The English Problem

Name: The English Problem
Brand: Crown
SKU: 9780593798461-PRUSDTR
Price: 190.0 HKD
Availability: InStock

A Novel

Beena Kamlani (Author) ... more

Edition: US - Hardback

Variant

Price:

HK$190.00 HK$290.00

Stock:

Re-stocking soon

Quantity:

Product Info

English • Age Adult - Adult

480 pages • 6.125 x 9.25 x 0.9688 in

Approx. weight: 1.53 lb

Publication date: 28 Jan,2025

Barcode: 9780593798461 • Crown

More books in English for Age Adult - Adult

Fiction: general and literary

Fiction: general and literary
Historical fiction
Narrative theme: Coming of age

Share this product

By: Beena Kamlani

In this stunning debut novel, a young Indian man comes to England in 1931, determined to overthrow British rule back home—but the insidiousness of colonialism as well as a sexual awakening get in his way.

Shiv Advani is an eighteen-year-old growing up in India. But he is no ordinary young man. Shiv has been personally chosen by Mahatma Gandhi to come to England, learn their laws, and then return home and help drive the British out of India. Before he leaves, his family insists he fulfill his arranged marriage, and he is hastily betrothed to a young woman he hardly knows.

He arrives in London and soon discovers a world he is both repelled by and drawn to. Shiv knows his duty: get in, learn the letter of the law, get out. But as anyone who has ever lived in a British colony can tell you, “the English Problem” is multifaceted. The racist colonialism of “the empire on which the sun never sets” seeps into everything—not just landed territories, but territories of the mind: literature, language, religion, sexuality, self-identity. Soon the people Shiv sought to be liberated from will be the people he desperately wants to be a part of. In the end, Shiv must fight not only for his country’s liberation but also his own.

Set against the backdrop of the Indian independence movement, with appearances by historical figures such as Virginia and Leonard Woolf and Mahatma Gandhi, The English Problem is so self-assured and ambitious, it is hard to believe it is a debut.