Return of a King: The Battle for Afghanistan, 1839-42

by William Dalrymple

At the very height of the British Empire, at a point when the British controlled more of the world economy than they would ever do again, and at a time when traditional forces were everywhere being massacred by industrialised colonial armies, it was a rare moment of complete colonial humiliation.

“the joys and the griefs of this fleeting faithless world do not last: ‘the world is a dream—however you imagine it, it passes away; until you pass away yourself.’ ”11

good stuff