Encyclopaedia of British Indologists

Gopal Ch. Sarkar’s Encyclopaedia of British Indologists is an outstanding work of reference meant to adorn the shelves of master libraries and the elite collections of book lovers. This unique work lists the British writers and researchers–both major and minor–on India from the eighteenth century onwards, presents capsule biographies which are masterpieces of condensation, bibliographs their major books and papers on Indian lore and culture, frequently adding extended extracts from their writings. Beginning with William Jones, Charles Wilkins, Halhed, Carey and Colebrooke and their contemporaries, continuing through H.H. Wilson, Macauley, Rev. James Long, Monier Williams et al and bringing the lists up to date with Grierson, Havell, Sister Nivedita, A.B. Keith this encyclopaedia offers an embarrassment of riches for those interested in the cultural consequences of the east-west encounter. Sarkar casts his net deep and wide to include such litterateurs like Kipling, E.M. Forster and Jim Corbett–writers not usually classed with indologists but whose perspectives on India have always been controversial and provocative. This is a major work on indological research (on the folk cultures, classical traditions, languages, religions and world of Indian life, myth and legend) and a profound contribution to the cultural fallout resulting from the creative collision of the east with the west.