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The Honourable Company, by John Keay
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During 200 years the East India Company grew from a loose association of Elizabethan tradesmen into "the grandest society of merchants in the universe". As a commercial enterprise it came to control half the world's trade and as a political entity it administered an embryonic empire. Without it there would have been no British India and no British Empire. In a tapestry ranging from Southern Africa to north-west America, and from the reign of Elizabeth I to that of Victoria, bizarre locations and roguish personality abound. From Bombay to Singapore and Hong Kong the political geography of today is, in some respects, the result of the Company. This book looks at the history of the East India Company.
- Sales Rank: #1175666 in Books
- Brand: HarperCollins
- Published on: 1993-10-11
- Released on: 1993-10-22
- Original language: English
- Number of items: 1
- Dimensions: 7.99" h x 1.26" w x 5.00" l, .75 pounds
- Binding: Paperback
- 496 pages
- HarperCollins
- HarperCollins
- HarperCollins
From Publishers Weekly
For 213 years, beginning around 1700, the "incorrigible pioneering" of merchant traders of the East India Company furthered the "peculiarly diffuse character" of the British Empire. British author Keay tells an ambitious story with sweep and brio, encompassing the company's origins as a "bane of bedraggled pioneers" in search of spices in the remote Indonesian archipelago; its role in the 1690 founding of Calcutta (an episode of "commercial greed and political mayhem"); and the opening up of China in 1700, which was to become the company's most profitable trade. Keay not only portays some of the adventurers and potentates who encountered one another but also grasps the details of trade, some more momentous than others: one missive from London to India mixed declarations of war with Spain and complaints about a bar bill. The company's monopoly charter was eventually broken not by rival traders but by British manufacturers wanting more overseas outlets for their products. If, as Keay notes, there are "enough incomplete histories of the Company to justify a health warning," then this book is a salubrious contribution. Photos not seen by PW.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Booklist
Conventional wisdom has it that the commercial imperialism of the early English trading companies was intertwined with the political imperialism of the expanding British empire. In this reexamination of the English East India Company, Keay, an author and broadcaster specializing in Asian history, acknowledges that "but for the Company there would have been not only no British India but also no global British Empire." But he also shows that the triumph of imperialism helped bring about the downfall of the company by eliminating its monopolies and creating conditions for the 1857 Indian mutiny. Keay's title is intentionally ironic; he reports, "venal and disreputable, [the company's] servants were believed to have betrayed their race by begetting a half caste tribe of Anglo-Indians, and their nation by corrupt government and extortionate trade." Published two years ago in Britain and cited as one of that year's three best books by the Financial Times (London), The Honourable Company fascinatingly illuminates one of the lesser-known chapters of Asian history. David Rouse
From Kirkus Reviews
From a British specialist in Asian affairs, this is comprehensive, fact-choked history of the Engish East India Company, which went to India to trade and founded an empire--the British Raj. Chosen as one of the three best books of the year in England by the Financial Times, it is a bold attempt to tell the action- packed story of a trading company that was founded in 1600 and continued in business until 1873; a company that, stretching from London to China, was once the world's largest trading power. Over the course of two centuries it behaved more like an independent principality as it made treaties, waged wars, and acquired territories. Created in London by ``men with long heads and deep purposes,'' it originally sought to gain for England a portion of the profitable spice trade, which had been hitherto controlled by the Spanish, Portuguese, and Dutch. There was also a secondary purpose--to find markets for Britain's wool cloth, an absurdist subtext to the more colorful trading ventures as the British merchants vainly tried to sell heavy fustian to tropical peoples. Beginning with the early days when these entrepreneurs were more buccaneers than legitimate traders, Keay goes on to describe the derring-do and occasional chicanery that led to the granting of trading rights; the great fortunes made in India by men such as Thomas Pitt, the great-grandfather of Prime Minister William Pitt; the founding of cities like Calcutta and Bombay; the regulations made in response to attacks by Edmund Burke, who claimed the company had broken every treaty it had ever made and sold every title it had ever dispensed; the opium sales that paid for the entire investment in tea; and the eventual takeover by the British government intent on creating an empire. Keay has written a colorful, swashbuckling saga filled with epic characters and ambitions as corporate history merges with world history. A notable achievement. -- Copyright �1994, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.
Most helpful customer reviews
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful.
Great narrative history....but.
By Mr. Claggart
John Keay's work "The Honorable Company" is a tour de force of historical evidence charting the rise and fall of the British East India Company. "The Company" was intially chartered as another vehicle of English economic imperialism in the 17th century, competing for the riches of the East and Asia. The author painstakingly unfolds the events of its amazing rise to power and influence, and more importantly, how the BEIC gradually became the "unofficial" goverment of India after approximately 1650
The book jacket claims the author researched this subject for 30 years, and the level of scholarship confirms his efforts. However, the book lacks the precise focus of academic history that investigates the implications of the economic events and how they affected the political power struggle in Europe. Keay does not directly explain the theory, and practice of mercantilism, its origins in the 17th century and how it would become the half-way house for the evolution of 19th century capitalism. Many of the 17th and 18th century "merchant kings" financed the industries of later 19th century, shifting the emphasis away from trade and barter, to "industrialized" manufacturing for profit. Overall, this is an excellent study of the BEIC.
0 of 0 people found the following review helpful.
Worth reading ..
By subhash kasturi
The most difficult part about writing the company biography is to classify which event or decision is the most important part in scripting the future. Keay's research in this aspect speaks for itself through out the book. A journey of 400 years scripted in a few hundred pages has been narrated with so much Intrigue that it is hard to leave the chapter unread. Travelling centuries with different characters, each contributing a significant part to history, yet showing there big picture of political, social influencers is a well done job. The book is I interesting for both information hunting historians as well as intrigue filled story teller.
0 of 0 people found the following review helpful.
Well told story of a relatively untold part of world history
By FarTraveler
Excellent as a history of the relationship between Britain and the East Indies, primarily focusing on India itself. Links the ups and downs as reflections of wider issues, such as the wars between the British, the French and Dutch, and on the (mostly unsuccessful) efforts Asians made to control the rapacious traders and ultimately colonists.
If you're not into the history of this part of the world, you probably won't like it.
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