City of Djinns: A Year in Delhi

£8.99

Dalrymple’s second book was the result of a six year stay in Delhi. Here he removes the focus from his own experiences to instead attempt to uncover the various layers of both old and new Delhi. Continually digging deeper into the city’s history he examines the traumatic events of the Partition of India, the 1984 riots that followed the assassination of Indira Gandhi, the ancient Hindu origin of the city, Mughal and British Colonial rule, and the Sikh community.

It’s the contemporary mayhem and meetings with surreal characters that enable the historical digressions. Along the way he has encounters with pigeon fanciers, Sufi mystics, Moslem healers, musicians, calligraphers, philosophers and a guild of eunuchs. It’s a fascinating and compulsory read for anyone visiting Delhi or India and the winner of the 1994 Thomas Cook Travel Book Award and Sunday Times Young British Writer of the Year.