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A review by tomleetang
The Jewel in the Crown by Paul Scott
4.0
The Jewel in the Crown is the story of a rape, as the first page of the novel will tell you, but it is of course much more than that. It is the story of the end of the British Raj, and the racial tensions that surrounded it. It is the story of India in 1942, with the specter of the Japanese on the doorstep; an India deeply divided on how to achieve independence and what to do with that independence. And it is the story of a handful of Europeans who try to overcome the elitism of their own kind to build bridges with Indians as fellow human beings. (Spoiler: Most of them fail.) It is an education on a pivotal moment in 20th century history as well as an engrossing story on the evils of mob violence and racial segregation.
What’s great about this novel is that it depicts the story of the rape from lots of different perspectives – I know how that sounds, bear with me – and in so doing shows how different types of people perceive the Indian populace and the move towards independence: there’s the forward-thinking regional deputy commissioner; the conservative brigadier; a Rajput princess; a prominent Indian businessman; the rape victim’s Anglo-Indian lover and the English rape victim herself.
Yet while each character represents a particular societal viewpoint, they are also profoundly individual, with their own sympathetic and unsympathetic aspects. They often contradict one another or have singular opinions on the same issues, and thus The Jewel in the Crown is also about trying to find the line between how our views/actions are dictated by race and how our views/actions are dictated by the fact that we’re each unique individuals.
What’s great about this novel is that it depicts the story of the rape from lots of different perspectives – I know how that sounds, bear with me – and in so doing shows how different types of people perceive the Indian populace and the move towards independence: there’s the forward-thinking regional deputy commissioner; the conservative brigadier; a Rajput princess; a prominent Indian businessman; the rape victim’s Anglo-Indian lover and the English rape victim herself.
Yet while each character represents a particular societal viewpoint, they are also profoundly individual, with their own sympathetic and unsympathetic aspects. They often contradict one another or have singular opinions on the same issues, and thus The Jewel in the Crown is also about trying to find the line between how our views/actions are dictated by race and how our views/actions are dictated by the fact that we’re each unique individuals.