Customer Reviews
A good introduction - By: Ibrahim Ali, 06 Aug 2008 
An excellent history of the partition & somewhat uniquely the author tries make this a social history. The intricacies of deal nor the personal politics of the big players are not covered but you do get a sense of what the situation was like on the ground. However Yasmin Khan seems to get stuck between writing a full social history & straight forward linear one & as a result we sometimes only get a glimpse of both. Ideally this book should be slightly longer & focus more on what was happening on the ground, as it stands it makes for an excellent introduction to the subject though we are left wanting for more.
Not impressed - By: Miran Ali, 01 Dec 2007 
I bought this book after reading a positive reviewin the Economist. I am not sure why it has attracted such stellar reviews everywhere. The prose I found uninspiring. The narrative throws no new light on the history of the partition. Yes, it does focus a great deal on the experience of the common man, but I don't see what makes this book deserving of such praise.
Insight at nearly both a human and a practical level - By: Angus Cunningham, 12 Sep 2007 
"Partition is a lasting lesson of both the dangers of imperial hubris & the reactions of extreme nationalism".
Ms. Khan's account of the destruction (and a little of the re-emergence) of stable feelings of belongingin South Asia is both searingin narrative & reflective of the dangers of haste at the top, both British & indigenous, to ordinary people compelled to live with the consequences of inadequately & simplistically visualized change. So much of the published history to datein English of the events before, during, & after Partition is about the dilemmas of the well-known figures who brought on, or tried to navigate, the always difficult passage from colonial empire to swaraj, self-rule. Ms. Khan takes a very valuable & radically different approach. Her book's narrative themes are developed from comments by, for the most part, middle class people contending with monstrous waves of fear, doubt, worry, anxiety, agony, & desperation.
The Great Partition tells how the ideas of Pakistan & swaraj triggered calamities that, with today's knowledge of cultural, linguistic, & religious development paths, could have been predicted. That they were not then is testimony to how much has since been learned by innumerable social scientists workingin subjects barely conceivedin the late 1940s as Pakistan & India began to emerge as independent states. Ms. Khan has rendered not only all those affected by Partition, but anyone charged with or aspiring to leadership, a service of great value. That she should be so young is especially good news, for what depth & breadth of insight can we expect from her next?
Missing still, at least to this reviewer, is a book that links the financial & political circumstances of Atlee's & Truman's governments to the horrendously unexpected &in due course calamitous decision of Mountbattenin early June 1947, when he announced -- to the surprise of virtually everyone around him -- that the dates of both Partition & Independence would be only 2-1/2 months ahead into what already was clear would be a riotful future.
