Introduction: the work of the dead; Part I: 1. Lahore and the possibility of politics; 2. What is to be done?; 3. Infinite Inquilab; Part II: Prologue; 4. Bhagat Singh's corpse; 5. In league with the dead; 6. Life and death in monuments; Conclusion: a politics of inheritance.
Interrogates the explosive potential of revolutionary anti-colonial 'afterlives' in contemporary Indian politics and society.
Chris Moffat is a British Academy Postdoctoral Fellow in the School of History, Queen Mary University of London.
'In this tightly argued investigation of the figure of the
revolutionary nationalist Bhagat Singh, Moffat explores the
relationship between history as documentary facts, and history as
political mythology. A timely intervention at a juncture where
Indian history is more contested than ever before.' Thomas Blom
Hansen, Stanford University, California
'A highly original study of India's revolutionary history, Chris
Moffat's book is unique in exploring the surprising afterlife of
this past. More than nostalgia for a losing argument in Indian
politics, Moffat argues that the revolutionary past has come to
possess a spectral agency. This is a nuanced and sophisticated
study of historical consciousness in modern India.' Faisal Devji,
University of Oxford
'In this imaginative reckoning with the spectacular and spectral
afterlives of Bhagat Singh, Chris Moffat offers a brilliant account
of history as hauntology. Based on sustained archival research and
wide-ranging field work, India's Revolutionary Inheritance compels
us to understand why and how some dead continue to have such a
purchase in the world of the living. A historical and conceptual
tour de force.' Sumathi Ramaswamy, Duke University, North
Carolina
'This impressive book offers not only a deeply insightful account
of Bhagat Singh's afterlives, but also a very timely and critical
reflection on disciplinary history's rigid boundaries between past
and present. Moffat makes an exceptionally important argument about
how politics is often more about gesture and action than doctrine
and belief.' Ajay Skaria, University of Minnesota
'Chris Moffat's Book India's Revolutionary Inheritance is a welcome
addition to the list of works that seek to overcome the tropes of
failure and defeat ... Moffat's book is then not only a challenge
to intellectual orthodoxiesn in History, but is also a political
intervention in our possible futures.' Ammar Ali Jan, Radical
Philosophy
'Moffat's work ... with its blend of field and archive, provides an
excellent example for how scholars might go about studying the
tangled temporal orders of contemporary South Asian politics, one
in which the divine, the dead and the living all play a part.'
Rahul Rose, South Asia@LSE
'This book is the result of [Moffat's] rigorously academic,
scholarly and yet social change-oriented research.' Chaman Lal,
Countercurrents.org
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