Description

This book is not a considered history, for
which there are a number of tomes
which may be more helpful to the reader.
But in many ways it is more “authentic’
than all the others put together because
the historian, in this case, has stayed
entirely in the background. The compiler,
who, incidentally, is not a historian
by training or vocation, has restricted
himself to putting before the reader items
which appeared in the Englishman and
the Frierd of India during the period
1836-50, interfering only by way of foot-
notes. Only items having a bearing on
the social aspect of life in Calcutta have
been included, thus imparting to the
volume a thematic content.A glimpse into the “Glimpses” may be got by a handful of examples from the Selections: the excommunication of
Dwarkanath Tagore by members of his own family: the noise generated by punch
houses in Lalbazar; the donations of Hindu students for famine victims in Ireland;extortion of puja subscriptions by
“baboos”: cheating at an examination ;
leakage of question papers: brickbatting
from the roof of Medical College; a
copyright suit filed by Charles Dickens
against some Calcutta papers; the
unplanned state of the city, its dusty and
potholed roads; the bad state of its
cemeteries, the ill-treatment of servants;
the opening of the Medical College; and
the poor immutable salaries of native clerks.SOCIAL history, G. M. Trevelyan has written, might be defined negatively as the history of a people with the politics left out. The aim of this book has been to
portray the social life of the people of Calcutta leaving out the purely economic
and commercial aspects of it. There are drawbacks to an approach such as this,
but there was no option given the shortage of time and space with which the people responsible for the volume were confronted. As it is, from the strictly social point of view, a lot has had to be left out-material which could only have enhanced the value of the book. But an author’s job is not only to put down on paper all that he has in his mind, but to do so in the space and time made available to him by his publisher. Nevertheless, it is our fervent hope and belief that the book as it is will not at least suffer from the defect of being unrepresentative of the social life of a city which was on its way to becoming the “second city of the British Empire.”

This book is not a considered history, for
which there are a number of tomes
which may be more helpful to the reader
But in many ways it is more authentic
than all the others put together because
the historian, in this case, has stayed
entirely in the background. The compiler
who, incidentally, is not a historian
by training or vocation, has restricted
himself to putting before the reader items
which appeared in the Englishman and
the Friend of india during the period
1836-50. interfering only by way of foot-
notes. Only items having a bearing on
the social aspect of life in Calcutta have
been included, thus imparting to the
volume a thematic content.A glimpse into the “Glimpses” may be got by a handful of examples from the Selections: the excommunication of Dwarkanath Tagore by members of his own family: the noise generated by punch houses in Lalbazar; the donations of Hindu students for famine victims in Ireland,extortion of puja subscriptions by baboos: cheating at an examination leakage of question papers: brickbatting from the roof of Medical College, a copyright suit filed by Charles Dickens against some Calcutta papers, the unplanned state of the city, its dusty and potholed roads; the bad state of its
cemeteries; the ill-treatment of servants:
the opening of the Medical College, and
the poor immutable salaries of native clerks.