Heart Like a Fakir

Chris Mason is professor of national security affairs and director of the Study of Internal Conflict (SOIC) at the US Army War College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, where he researches, writes, and teaches on civil wars, insurgencies, and modern and historical India. He has published extensively on South Asia, focusing on Afghanistan, India, and the nineteenth and twentieth century borderlands between the two countries. Dr. Mason is a retired foreign service officer with a PhD in imperial and colonial history from the George Washington University in Washington, DC.

• List of Illustrations Nomenclature Acknowledgments Introduction Chapter 1: Beginnings, 1807–1824 Chapter 2: Baptism of Fire, 1824–1826 Chapter 3: Reform and Progress, 1826–1834 Chapter 4: D’Arcy Todd and the Revenue Survey, 1834–1838 Chapter 5: A Mission to Khiva, 1838–1843 Chapter 6: A New Beginning, 1843–1849 Chapter 7: The Man Who Was King, 1849–1853 Chapter 8: Endings, 1854–1896 Appendix: Abbott the Artist Notes Bibliography Index About the Author

The timing and causes of the British East India Company's shift from a commercial to an imperial entity is a fundamental issue in world history given its broad repercussions. Mason explores this issue through a biographical lens. Postmodernist theory reduced the esteem of biography among many historians, but Mason shows the value of this approach. His study of Sir James Abbott (1807–96), a career officer in the East India Company, provides new insights into shifts in Anglo-Indian relationships at a critical time. Mason makes the case for a much later deterioration of interactions between the colonizer and the colonized, culminating in the many-named Great Mutiny, Sepoy Rebellion, Indian Mutiny, or First War of Independence in 1857. In addition to correspondence and published works, Abbott left frank diaries never intended for circulation. His posting to many South Asian regions of the British Empire gave him the opportunity to pen firsthand accounts of the Sikh kingdom in Sind (modern Pakistan) and the global frictions imperialism caused that later gave rise to the problems plaguing modern Afghanistan. This well-written account will engage both experts and casual readers. Recommended. General readers through faculty.