Book Review: The Anarchy by William Dalrymple

After reading this book, I felt this is how history should be told. This is not only the story about the rise of East India Company but a few hundred other stories too. This is the story of disintegration of Mughal kingdom. This is the story of Robert Clive taking bigger risks and luck favoring him. This is the story of how rashness ruined Bengal Nawab Siraj-ud Daula. This is the story of company losing many of the early battles but fighting back to win finally. This is the story how internal fights within Indian kingdoms gave advantage to European traders in becoming kingmakers. This is the story of Portugese and French companies inability to outsmart the English. This is the story of Tipu. This is the story of Maratha's. All happening in parallel and influencing each other.

William Dalrymple unravels the history of how a British company with initial aim of trading came to India and changed its history. He references lots of the works and weaves the story for us to understand the events in chronological order and the cause and effect with ease. He gets into the personality and mindset of the major people involved and how their approaches made or unmade the fortunes for them.

Once I began to read, I could not put it down. My understanding of history got lot enriched with this read. I would recommend this to all history lovers and also to those readers in general who want to understand how kingdoms are made and unmade.