- Paperback: 304 pages
- Publisher: Harper Perennial Canada (Jan 2 2003)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 000639177X
- ISBN-13: 978-0006391777
- Product Dimensions: 20.1 x 13.5 x 2 cm
- Shipping Weight: 249 g
- Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #432,673 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Product Details |
Product Description
From Publishers Weekly
Neither as accessible as Jasmine nor as superbly crafted as National Book Critics Circle Award-winner The Middleman and Other Stories , Mukherjee's new novel is a challenging work that engages the intellect more than the heart. Narrator Beigh Masters is a Yale grad who has put her history degree to use in "assets research," tracking down rare art and jewels for wealthy clients. Her pet research project involves Hannah Easton, born in Massachusetts in 1670, who went on to marry an English trader, journey with him to India at the dawn of European colonization and become the lover of a Hindu prince. This novel is Hannah's story, told by Beigh with an emphasis on the themes that interest her: the nature of time, the merit of attempts to recapture the past, the collision of values that inevitably occurs when New World meets Old, the power wielded by unconventional women in a hidebound society and the revenge that such a society exacts. Mukherjee writes with her customary elegant lucidity; her insights into 17th-century America, England and India are as tough-minded and astute as anything she has written about contemporary society; and she spins a rousing narrative of greed, lust, battles and betrayals. Readers may feel somewhat aloof from Hannah, who is viewed always from a distance, but an abundance of interesting ideas partly compensates for the book's lack of an emotional center.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
From Library Journal
Exotic locales and historical-genealogical connections color this novel by the author of Jasmine ( LJ 7/89). Beigh is a contemporary New England woman of Indian (that is, "Indian-Indian, not wah-wah Indian") heritage, who is in love with technocrat Venn from India. Beigh is obsessed with antiquities. The graduate work she was doing on the Puritans had led her to the discovery of one of her ancestors, a Hannah Easton, who traveled from her home in New England all the way to India with her trader husband. The author has woven together Hannah's story with Beigh's search for ancient jewels and legends. Mukherjee writes about all these unusual times and places with a style that is mesmerizing. Unfortunately, the dialog of bygone eras too frequently sounds contrived. Recommended for larger fiction collections.
- Ann H. Fisher, Radford P.L., Va.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
- Ann H. Fisher, Radford P.L., Va.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
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Most helpful customer reviews
3.0 out of 5 stars
Such an interesting story,
By
This review is from: Holder Of The World (Paperback)
"The Holder of the World" was an interesting story, however it was so emotionally detached from its readers that I found it hard to get through. Perhaps I would have given it more stars if I had more of a historical background myself, because I found the first two parts of the story very difficult to get through. There was so much historical information given, yet the reader was not given the opportunity to become emotionally vested in any of the characters. The third part of the story was far more interesting to me- we follow Hannah Easton as she conquers India and immerses herself in the culture there.
I really think that this book had the potential to be a great story, appealing to wide audiences. I do think that it fell short of the expectations I had before reading it, and that I would have enjoyed it more if it had been told from the perspective of Hannah Easton. The story is actually told from the point of view of Beigh Masters, but we only catch fleeting and insignificant glimpses into her life, and her presence in the book seems to me to be unnecessary. I would have liked to learn more about her, to become more involved in her life- that, too, would have made the book more interesting to the general reader. All in all, this was a good book- a firm plot, an interesting storyline. I just think that in the end it ended up appealing to a smaller audience than the author perhaps intended. It is still well worth reading for anyone with a particular interest in history or foreign culture.
4.0 out of 5 stars
Virtual history: being there,
By
This review is from: Holder of the World (Paperback)
The more I ponder this book, the more intriguing I find the story. Beigh Masters is an "asset-hunter" in search of a legendary diamond from India, The Emperor's Tear. Her research leads to a connection with a distant relative, Hannah Easton, who lived in Salem, Mass., in the 1670's. Now fascinated by her own familial ties, Beigh traces Hannah's life from New England to the Coromandel Coast and the powerful East India Trading Company. Most extraordinary, Hannah becomes the "Salem Bibi", the white lover of a Hindu Raja, carving herself a place in history.But there is more: the novel is so brilliantly themed, the premise so unique, that this reader was guided through a journey of staggering originality. Beigh's lover/companion, Venn, is developing a computer program that would allow an individual to experience a few moments in the past, set to a specific time frame, with pertinent information entered into the program. Beigh provides the structural facts, creating the opportunity to ......? Is it really even possible? This is not "time-travel" as usually written, but Virtual participation in real time. Mukerjee actually ties the threads of history together, from one side of the world to the other, suggesting infinite permutations. Not your traditional historical novel, Mukerjee fashions an ending worthy of any mystery-adventure devotee. Experiencing this story is an adventure in itself.
5.0 out of 5 stars
A virtuoso miniature,
By Winston Barclay (Iowa City, IA) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Holder of the World (Paperback)
Bharati Mukherjee emigrated from her Brahmin family's insular compound in India to study at the Iowa Writers' Workshop, and her abiding literary yantra ever since has been inter-cultural dislocation, transplantation and rebirth -- in particular the collision of intransigent tradition with the chaotic possibilities at freedom's edge. In "The Holder of the World," she does not merely turn her personal experience on its head, but she does dizzying somersaults with full twists in midair. The context and model for her treasure-hunt mystery is one of the fascinating artistic traditions of the Indian subcontinent: Mughal miniature painting. The unexpected depiction of a fair-skinned Western woman in one of these 17th-century paintings launches the narrator on detective work she expects to lead to material treasure, but what she exhumes as virtual reality and historical truth converge is both tantalizingly less tangible and inestimably more valuable. The particular virtuosity of this slender volume is Mukherjee's determined compression of plot, narrative, character and information that makes reading something akin to aerobic exercise. Brief phrases and gestures become complex characterizations; sketches and outlines evoke transcontinental adventures; narrative whizzes by in a blur that somehow suggests rich detail; well-placed smudges and squiggles expand into vast landscapes. "The Holder of the World" is a sprawling, wide-screen historical epic, painted in miniature with a one-hair brush.
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