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Private Life of an Indian Prince
Anands most profound study of human nature The story of a mans compelling love for a woman, this is at the same time a historical novel of unusual power, showing the demise of the princely states with the birth of a free India. Maharaja Ashok Kumar of Sham Pur asserts complete independence for his small hill-state rather than join the Indian Union. A febrile romantic who has inherited more of the vices than the virtues of his ancestors, he is encouraged by his nymphomaniac mistress Ganga Dasi, a powerful and illiterate hill-woman whom he has installed in his palace to the exclusion of his three legitimate maharanis. To feed his mistresss greed, he extorts large sums of money from his starving peasantry. This provokes a revolt in Sham Pur which in turn incurs the extreme displeasure of the government in Delhi. His personal impulses and passions blind the Maharaja from the larger social issues involved. He meets Gangas challenge with hysterical tears, and his people and the Government of India with melodramatic gestures and self-deluding lies. Needless to say, he loses both contests. Exiled to London, he seduces a shop girl with all his former princely finesse. But he cannot forget his mistress and his love for her brings about his downfall.
424 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1953
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533 people want to read
About the author
Mulk Raj Anand
177 books238 followersMulk Raj Anand was an Indian writer in English, notable for his depiction of the lives of the poorer castes in traditional Indian society. One of the pioneers of Indo-Anglian fiction, he, together with R.K. Narayan, Ahmed Ali and Raja Rao, was one of the first India-based writers in English to gain an international readership. Anand is admired for his novels and short stories, which have acquired the status of being classic works of modern Indian English literature, noted for their perceptive insight into the lives of the oppressed and their analyses of impoverishment, exploitation and misfortune. He is also notable for being among the first writers to incorporate Punjabi and Hindustani idioms into English.
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Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews
May 7, 2013
Very enjoyable tale of the final days of the Maharajahs as the Indian Union is formed. The important historic events provide the background for the story of one Maharajah's private life. His obsession with one of his mistresses is all encompassing and to some extent this created a flaw for me, it began to get rather tedious to hear about him obsessing about her once again. However there are enough other incidents, including a tiger hunt and a shopping spree in London, to make the thing move along. The narrator, the prince's personal doctor, is in many ways the more interesting character as he philosophies about the moral issues of governance. An interesting and somewhat unusual setting.
September 1, 2019
Private life of an Indian Prince (Hardcover) by Mulk Raj Anand- novel- Mulkraj Anand is an Indian writer- a humanist- this book scribes the time of independence of India from British. During this period, on one side the country was partitioined into India and Pakistan while on the other side, Princely States were provided an option to merge with either India or with Pakistan by signing an instrument of accession with either government. The story is about Prince Victor Ashok Kumar of Shampur. As usual, lust is his primary nature. Sardar Patel has invited him to sign an the Hiinstrument and inform him about the faciliies which can be ofered in independent India. It is found that he has eloped with a eur-asian girl in Simla. In his State, Praja Mandal and the communal forces want to merge with India as the governance of the state law and order his not been able to be restored. Dr Hari Shankar a medic is his advisor who is aware of the reality for partition and accession and tenders proper advice but the Prnice has no time to bother about this. He knows about the petty bad postion of jails and poverty of his people, and the brutal ways of the police handling people, still he is bothered about his lavish life. He is more interested in arranging Shikar with his Amerian friends. With changing circumstances, his lady Ganga Dasi beds with his Amerian friend and later elopes with his friend. Prince visits London and plan to murder his friend with whom Ganga Dasi is living. He succeeds but the crime is caught. He is broght back before the authorities where he is declared lunatic and sent to an Asylum in Pune. The book does not create much interest in the reader. People have accepted the life of people who have joined the mainstream of Indian life. It is quite an interesting book about a speicfic period in the life of India.
August 18, 2013
I read good feedback about this book from Soros Kowasjee and bought the book. It shows the decay and decadent life of an indian prince in 1940s and early 50's. Raja of Shampur , victor , is a vain character with all the vices including a lusty picadillo nature , sloth , vanity , hubris ... He has two ranis and 1 permanent mistress. Mistress is able to keep him under her spell and under her control. He is unable to avoid her open manipulation and Instead caught by his jealousy for her thinly veiled promiscuity, he tries to win her over. This ultimately becomes his undoing. This is aggravated by end of princely states due to indian freedom resulting in dissolving of princely states into democratic india.
Story has connections with real life events and characters, used sufficient creative licence of fiction.
Story has connections with real life events and characters, used sufficient creative licence of fiction.
June 23, 2017
The novel disappointed me. It was incredibly long and boring, and I felt like abandoning it in the middle. Despite all the praises doled out by Cawosjee in his Intro, the novel failed to meet my expectations. I would any day prefer the novels of R.K. Narayan, a contemporary of Anand than this one-sided tale of foolish lust, leading to the downfall of a worthless Prince.
January 4, 2014
Poignant, moving. But often verbose. Many of the extensive philosophical discussions were lost on me. Most of all though, I couldn't find any "central aspect" of the book that I could relate to.
February 2, 2023
This novel deals with the disintegration of Princely India following independence and the torment of the Indian Princes.
Victor, the Indian Prince, is one of the six hundred Indian Rajas, Maharajas and Nawabs, who has all the vices of royalty. He has wives whom he pays no attention to or ill-treats, he has a mistress, Gangi, who tyrannizes over him, he has his moods and his musings, and he wallows by and large in lavishness and sloth.
Sardar Patel summons him at last to Delhi, keeps him waiting till he loses his nerve, and then he is made to sign the Instrument of Accession. But the administration of his State continues to be rotten.
Victor has new troubles, and he goes to the United Kingdom on an imposed holiday. He is soon called back, being in the meanwhile caught up in the murder of a rival in love. Upon his return to India, he becomes mad and enters an Asylum where the novelist is content to leave him.
The novel is awash with diminutive intrigues centring round sex, and Anand's aim is to combine modern-day political history with the personal history of a few individuals.
The book, nevertheless rather leaves an impression of cram, like the memory of a terrible dream one has been through.
Truth be told, Anand doesn't know the main character too well. Much of the interest and deception in the novel is centred in Victor's terminal obsession for Gangi. It is much akin to the call of one chamelon for another, for they had both emerge, with comparable temperaments, from the orbits of their individual affairs and mistake their exhaustion for the urgent need of each other.
It is as though they are prisoners of each other, as though they are continuously feeding and eating and destroying each other, and this, maddening aberration in their relationship is appropriately reflected, in ever increasing measure, in the oddity in the state of affairs in Victor's state.
The novel has very little appeal and Anand is not at his best in this novel.
Victor, the Indian Prince, is one of the six hundred Indian Rajas, Maharajas and Nawabs, who has all the vices of royalty. He has wives whom he pays no attention to or ill-treats, he has a mistress, Gangi, who tyrannizes over him, he has his moods and his musings, and he wallows by and large in lavishness and sloth.
Sardar Patel summons him at last to Delhi, keeps him waiting till he loses his nerve, and then he is made to sign the Instrument of Accession. But the administration of his State continues to be rotten.
Victor has new troubles, and he goes to the United Kingdom on an imposed holiday. He is soon called back, being in the meanwhile caught up in the murder of a rival in love. Upon his return to India, he becomes mad and enters an Asylum where the novelist is content to leave him.
The novel is awash with diminutive intrigues centring round sex, and Anand's aim is to combine modern-day political history with the personal history of a few individuals.
The book, nevertheless rather leaves an impression of cram, like the memory of a terrible dream one has been through.
Truth be told, Anand doesn't know the main character too well. Much of the interest and deception in the novel is centred in Victor's terminal obsession for Gangi. It is much akin to the call of one chamelon for another, for they had both emerge, with comparable temperaments, from the orbits of their individual affairs and mistake their exhaustion for the urgent need of each other.
It is as though they are prisoners of each other, as though they are continuously feeding and eating and destroying each other, and this, maddening aberration in their relationship is appropriately reflected, in ever increasing measure, in the oddity in the state of affairs in Victor's state.
The novel has very little appeal and Anand is not at his best in this novel.
February 15, 2026
This is a story about Maharaja Ashok Kumar of Sham Pur, who falls in love with a Brahman woman he cannot legally marry. The woman manipulates him for her personal gains as long as she can and eventually leaves him, which drives the Maharaja to madness. When you look at it from the story's point of view, although it's not entirely a love story, it definitely gets across its point that love can make or break you.
And from the storytelling perspective, oh, it contains beautiful imagery and details; it feels like everything is happening right in front of your eyes. The writer has put in so much effort to describe each and every scene but never lets it get boring or too far-fetched. It is easy to read, keeps you on the edge of your seat, and gives a detailed perspective on the post independence political scenario and unrest in India. A slight understanding of the political dynamics mentioned would help one connect with the story better.
The story also made me wonder how the people who want to feel powerful do not do so by standing against the authority more powerful than them but by exploiting those who are weaker.
The narrator not only narrates the story plainly but also leaves hints of his own philosophical perspective. The one part I particularly liked is where he talks about free will:
"...desire is an essential element in us and all our actions are motivated by it; and we feel that we can choose to do this or that freely; that is to say, we feel the illusion that our will is free. And thus we go on, until we realise that, though there is free will in a limited sense, we are really bound by responsibilities, duties, even as we have a certain number of rights - and then we are freed in a higher sense by the recognition of our responsibilities in a universe which is determined by the acts, thoughts and feelings of other peoples both in the past and the present."
And from the storytelling perspective, oh, it contains beautiful imagery and details; it feels like everything is happening right in front of your eyes. The writer has put in so much effort to describe each and every scene but never lets it get boring or too far-fetched. It is easy to read, keeps you on the edge of your seat, and gives a detailed perspective on the post independence political scenario and unrest in India. A slight understanding of the political dynamics mentioned would help one connect with the story better.
The story also made me wonder how the people who want to feel powerful do not do so by standing against the authority more powerful than them but by exploiting those who are weaker.
The narrator not only narrates the story plainly but also leaves hints of his own philosophical perspective. The one part I particularly liked is where he talks about free will:
"...desire is an essential element in us and all our actions are motivated by it; and we feel that we can choose to do this or that freely; that is to say, we feel the illusion that our will is free. And thus we go on, until we realise that, though there is free will in a limited sense, we are really bound by responsibilities, duties, even as we have a certain number of rights - and then we are freed in a higher sense by the recognition of our responsibilities in a universe which is determined by the acts, thoughts and feelings of other peoples both in the past and the present."
February 13, 2022
Please provide Online Book for reading
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
April 5, 2012
It did not grab me.
July 7, 2012
Highly over rate book. A big disappointment from Mulk Raj after coolie.
June 16, 2012
life wasnt too easy for the royals in India who cooperated with the Raj.
May 13, 2018
Though the book is based on India soon after independence, reading the book proves that history repeats itself in India. In the book, the cunning selfish greedy bania and brahmin combine to drive the Rajput prince of Shampur mad, and in 2018 also brahmin, bania intelligence and security agency employees, their associates combine to have honest hardworking kshatriya engineers from top colleges, declared mentally unsound, to steal their resume, savings, correspondence and memory
Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews