Preface
1: Parsi Pioneers
2: Imperial Wanderers
3: Elusive Quest
4: Reviving the Dream
5: Men in White
6: The Captain's Story
7: City of the World
8: Indian Summer
9: Lost and Won
10: Beyond the Boundary
11: Ends and Beginnings
Bibliography
Index
Shortlisted for the 2020 Wolfson History Prize
Prashant Kidambi is Associate Professor in Colonial Urban History
at the University of Leicester. After completing postgraduate
degrees in History at the Jawaharlal Nehru University in New Delhi,
he was awarded a Rhodes Scholarship to study at the University of
Oxford. Kidambis research explores the interface between British
imperialism and the history of modern South Asia. He is the author
of The Making of an Indian Metropolis: Colonial Governance and
Public
Culture in Bombay, 1890-1920 and the editor of Bombay Before
Mumbai: Essays in Honour of Jim Masselos.
Cricket Country marks a very significant departure from the
conventional writings on Indian cricket in "setting its narrative
within a transnational frame"...It also significantly contributes
to the genre of exploring neglected episodes of Indian sporting
history and reconstructing the fascinating narratives of those
episodes in the context of colonial and postcolonial India.
*Kausik Bandyopadhyay, Journal of Modern History*
For scholars involved in the humanities and social sciences of
sport, there is much to learn and use from the findings reported by
Kidambi from his archival research. For the philosophers of sport,
this material should also prompt further reflection on the
implications of spreading sports over large geographical areas
while sticking to formally unified technical frameworks.
*Jacob Kornbeck, The International Journal of the History of
Sport*
Shortlisted for the 2020 Wolfson History Prize
Selected as a 2019 Sport Book of the Year in The Financial
Times
Prashant Kidambi tells the intriguing story of the first
"All-India", and largely forgotten, team to reach British shores
... Kidambi's achievement is to retrieve from obscurity the
backbone of the team, including a Dalit, or low-caste, bowler
Palwankar Baloo, and Muslim cricketers from the Islamic educational
centre of Aligarh.
*James Lamont, The Financial Times*
5* review: This book is an engagingly written and deeply researched
social history of the last days of imperial Britain, and the first
days of Modern India. The 1911 tour is used as a framing device
through which the author explores the ties that bound the colony
together and the slow beginnings of an Indian nationhood. It is a
history book, not a cricket book, and all the better for it.
*Theo Barclay, The Daily Telegraph*
Kidambi's forensic eye and vast array of sources make for a ...
nuanced revisionism. Not that he pulls his punches.
*Shomit Dutta, The Times Literary Supplement*
Cricket Country explores both the history of imperial British
cricket in India and colonial Indian cricket in Britain, as well as
cricket as a vehicle for nation-building, cultural diplomacy,
imperial pedagogy and masculinity, but at its heart tells the tale
of a group of men in search of sporting glory... Prashant Kidambi
traces the story with great detail, which will delight cricket
enthusiasts.
*Shompa Lahiri, BBC History Magazine*
You don't have to know a lot about cricket, or even be an
enthusiast, to enjoy this book ... [Kidambi] uses a lot of archival
material, and presents a lot of original research, but writes it in
a very engaging way.
*Richard Evans, Five Books (The Best History Books: the 2020
Wolfson Prize shortlist)*
Kidambi has produced a masterly piece of sports scholarship, fit to
be considered alongside books on more weighty historical subjects.
The depth of his research is extraordinary and his knowledge of
Indian history [...] is just as important as his knowledge of
cricket ... this is a terrific book.
*Richard Whitehead, The Cricketer*
This is a richly detailed, rewarding, fascinating book.
*Alex Massie, Wisden Cricketers' Almanack 2020*
The book is 10 years' work and it shows, in its elegance and
detail. By going somewhere so unexplored, and producing something
so original, Kidambi lays claim to being a Rahul Dravid among
cricket historians.
*Gideon Haigh, The Australian*
a formidable piece of scholarship that recreates the time in
staggering detail.
*Sharda Ugra, ESPNcricinfo*
The work that has gone into Cricket Country is astonishing... there
is still a particular pleasure to be had from the experience of
reading a book as well edited and produced as this one... Cricket
Country goes well beyond the usual parameters of cricket writing...
for those who are interested in where the Indian game has come from
it really is a 'must read'.
*Martin Chandler, Cricket Web*
Meticulously researched and impeccably sourced, this is a
first-rate book of serious history that also happens to be about
cricket... A well written and important book on a little-known
tour.
*Richard Lawrence, The Cricket Statistician*
A serious contribution to the literature on Indian cricket history
and cricket's position in the British Empire. Beyond that, it is an
engrossing and thoroughly engaging read.
*Neil Robinson, MCC Magazine*
With a nod to Edmund Blunden's famous book in his title, Kidambi
tells the little-known tale of the first Indian cricket team to
tour England, in the summer of 1911. This may well become a classic
to rank alongside the very best of cricket books.
*Mike Sansbury, The Grove Bookshop*
This magnificent book recreates the forgotten story of the first
All India cricket team, which toured England in 1911. Featuring
Brahmins and Dalits, Parsis and Muslims, and led by a Sikh, this
team was forging the idea of India on the sporting field while
Mohandas K. Gandhi was still an expatriate in South Africa. It is a
fascinating tale, and Prashant Kidambi tells it beautifully. He
juxtaposes vivid quotations from primary sources with deft sketches
of personalities, close accounts of cricket matches won and lost
with thoughtful meditations on imperialism and nationalism.
Scholars, students, history and sports buffs, will all find reading
Cricket Country an enormously educative as well as hugely enjoyable
experience. I certainly did.
*Ramachandra Guha, author of Gandhi: The Years That Changed the
World, 1914-1948*
More than a hundred summers ago, an All-India cricket team toured
England for the first time. Prashant Kidambi's wonderful account of
that pioneering team and its bid to represent a sub-continent is
the story of a motley band of cricketers calling India into being.
Through the history and itinerary of this would-be 'Indian' team,
Kidambi cunningly explores the meaning of belonging and
representation in British India. Cricket Country s easily the most
enjoyable non-fiction book you'll read this year.
*Mukul Kesavan, author of Men in White: A Book of Cricket*
Kidambi tells an intriguing story exceptionally well.
*Shreedutta Chidananda, The Hindu*
heavily researched and stylishly written
*The Tribune*
Cricket Country tells [its] riveting story with passion and
authority.
*Suresh Menon, The Hindu*
A beatifully researched history
*Supriya Nair, Mumbai Mirror*
Cricket Country ... is as much about the country as it is about
cricket. It is a book of history that uses cricket as a framing
device... [It] offers ... fascinating insights.
*Salil Tripathi, Mint*
Remarkably researched... The account of the tour is engrossing
*Uddalak Mukherjee, Telegraph India*
As you get pulled into the book, there is melodrama, rioting,
political manoeuvring and sneering condescension in a tight
partnership with nauseating sycophancy, drunkenness, sporting
skulduggery and back-stabbing.
*Ruchir Joshi, India Today*
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