William Dalrymple (historian)

"Everybody has their own India and I think it’s a nonsense construction, “a real India”. The real India might be the India of the villages and certainly there’s a lot to be said of the fact that India’…"

"I am basically writing for a general audience rather than an academic audience. So, I explain stuff, I don’t assume knowledge of any of this on the part of the reader. In a kind of general sense I sup…"

"Actually, when you have been in the country for a long time... whether it’s an Indian kid going to live in California working in a software company or whether its me coming to live here as historian a…"

"What has gone on in Iraq and Afghanistan has many echoes with what was going in this part of the world in 18th and 19th century - setting up of puppet governments, the lending of troops and the traini…"

"And who was this speaker, anyway? I waited to the end, enduring the nonsense of it all just to find out. It turned out to be William Dalrymple. Ah, of course. William Dalrymple, described here long ag…"

"In the past twenty years, he has rigorously pursued fascination for , writing one brilliant travel book , two vivid histories , and one anthology of acute acute journalism about South Asia. He came to…"

"Dalrymple is British—Scottish, to be exact—but his controversial statements are more likely to concern the country's Mughal or British past. He is today India's most famous narrative historian."

"I am writing definitely primarily for an audience who don’t know India."