Neil Posted October 8, 2021 Share Posted October 8, 2021 Hello there, I’m looking for novels with a colonial setting, contemporary novels written by people from that era who would have had some idea of what it was like back then. Preferably British Empire colonialism, but all ideas are welcome. To my knowledge I am currently aware of/have read the following books. Please recommend books written by different authors to the ones listed here as I am likely already aware of their other contributions. A few of these books (Ceremony, Potiki) bend the truth a little. They aren’t directly about the colonial experience but are about the clash of European and non-European cultures. So I am also open to semi-colonial literature like that too if you can think it’d be a good read. All of them — without exception — are contemporary though, the authors have experienced something like what they wrote about. Here’s what I have so far: A Grain of Wheat, Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o A Passage to India, E.M. Forster Burmese Days, George Orwell Ceremony, Leslie Marmon Silko Greenmantle, John Buchan Heart of Darkness, Joseph Conrad King Solomon’s Mines, H. Rider Haggard Kim, Rudyard Kipling Potiki, Patricia Grace Red Strangers, Elspeth Huxley Robinson Crusoe, Daniel Defoe Season of Migration to the North, Tayeb Salih The First Man, Albert Camus The Grass is Singing, Doris Lessing Things Fall Apart, Chinua Achebe Treasure Island, Robert Louis Stevenson Wide Sargasso Sea, Jean Rhys Thank you! Edit: unsure why I cannot make the text un-bold. The button doesn't appear to be working. Sorry about this! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hayley Posted October 8, 2021 Share Posted October 8, 2021 I can't think of any that you don't already have on your list but I did un-bold your text for you (you'll be able to edit posts yourself once you have ten posts). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marie H Posted October 9, 2021 Share Posted October 9, 2021 Hi Neil I would recommend Staying On by Paul Scott. This is a post-colonial sequel to Scott’s epic series The Raj Quartet/The Jewel in the Crown. Tusker & Lucy Smalley stayed on in India, after Tuskerk’s retirement as Colonel in the British Army. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KEV67 Posted December 6, 2021 Share Posted December 6, 2021 Oscar and Lucinda Nostromo by Joseph Conrad Black Mischief by Evelyn Waugh Nostromo was very good. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
willoyd Posted December 6, 2021 Share Posted December 6, 2021 Some more ideas. Some of these I read a while ago, so whilst I enjoyed them at the time, I may have changed my mind if reading them now! Some of these are definitely not contemporary, but they may still satisfy. Oroonoko by Aphra Behn A Season in Sinji by JL Carr The Luminaries by Eleanor Catton Noble House by James Clavell Last of the Mohicans by James Fenimore Cooper (one of five Leatherstocking Tales set in colonial North America) Voyageurs by Margaret Elphinstone The Singapore Grip by JG Farrell (also The Siege of Krishnapur, although this is rather less contemporary) Sea of Poppies by Amitav Ghosh A Quiet American by Grahame Greene (and others) The Black Lake by Hella S Haase The Far Pavilions by MM Kaye The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver Fragrant Harbour by John Lanchester The Cairo Trilogy by Naguib Mahfouz The Levant Trilogy by Olivia Manning The Painted Veil by W Somerset Maugham (and others) Cry, The Beloved Country by Alan Paton Black Mischief/Scoop by Evelyn Waugh The Voyage Out by Virginia Woolf Strictly speaking, I suppose the following are post-colonial, but I think they still say a lot about the colonial world - and they're brilliant books! Midnight's Children by Salman Rushdie A Suitable Boy by Vikram Seth A Bend in the River by VS Naipaul Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.