Corner Of A Foreign Field: The Indian History Of A British Sport

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  Guha personalizes a fantastic, lively history of cricket in mostly pre-independence India, and shows how it impacted the political, religious and caste shake-ups leading to independence. He uncovers some obscure cricket powerhouses, delves into historical controversies (such as, the annual matches between clubs divided by religion), and recalls his own fondness for cricket. Although he skimps on the post-independence cricket, this is a great book both for the history of India and cricket.

   

   

  by Matthew Lowe on Dec 23, 2009 at 05:48PM

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  So much has been written about Indian cricket that it is hard to get excited about a new book, except when it is by Ramchandra Guha: an excellent writer, and fine historian he takes his readers into the pleasures, quirks and foibles of Indian cricket history, while at the same time resurrecting one of the forgotten tales of Indian cricket - he exposes its class and caste elitism of the game through the story of Palwankar Baloo - a Dalit (Untouchable) who captained the Hindu team in one of the... (show more)

  So much has been written about Indian cricket that it is hard to get excited about a new book, except when it is by Ramchandra Guha: an excellent writer, and fine historian he takes his readers into the pleasures, quirks and foibles of Indian cricket history, while at the same time resurrecting one of the forgotten tales of Indian cricket - he exposes its class and caste elitism of the game through the story of Palwankar Baloo - a Dalit (Untouchable) who captained the Hindu team in one of the world's great competitions, the Bombay Pentangular, and had to overcome deepseated hostility to do so. Fabulous writing and scholarship. (show less)

   

   

  by Facebook User on Sep 14, 2008 at 05:16PM

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