Stepping Back in Time: Unknown Narratives of a City

As the subtitle of the book suggests, this is a fascinating collection of life-stories of ‘Caucasians’ in colonial Calcutta. Spread across nine chapters, the book gives us a kaleidoscopic picture of foreigners in the city from the late eighteenth century to the early decades of the twentieth. Ranging from figures associated with the ruling powers of the English East India Company to a police detective, from ‘Cousins of the Bard’ to the famous CSI—the ‘Comic Star of India’, we get a glimpse of the cosmopolitan world of the long nineteenth century in the imperial capital in these pages. The chapters touch upon a variety of themes and issues—intrigues, alliances, and negotiations of the colonial administrative corridors; the everyday social lives of the European families and the bachelors; workings of commercial capital and business ventures; the enchanting world of Italian opera and public entertainment; episodes of murky murders and shrewd sleuths. Literally, a dizzying array of cast and crew.