Sent to India aged just sixteen to make his fortune, Alexander Burnes soon revealed an extraordinary talent for languages, combined with a boyish charm, insatiable curiosity, and irrepressible enthusiasm. By the age of 26 he had so impressed his...

The description for this book, India's Political Economy, 1947-1977: The Gradual Revolution, will be forthcoming.

Set against feminist discourse, this title looks at the iconography of the Indian woman. Traced over the century these images suggest an extraordinary transformation in imaging the Indian woman, as manifested in painting, photography, popular posters and...

An inventive translation of a great historical epic, and the oldest surviving literary work in the Mongolian language, recounting the turbulent life and times of Genghis Khan and his Dothraki-like, nomadic horse lordsA Penguin ClassicThe Secret History...

From sleepy fishing village to samurai capital to vibrant global metropolis, Eiko Maruko Siniawer takes readers through Tokyo's rich history, revealing four centuries of transformation deeply woven into its fabric. This accessible guide introduces a...

How did India aspire to become a secular country? Given our colonial past, we derive many of our laws and institutions from England. We have a parliamentary democracy with a Westminster model of government. Our courts routinely use catchphrases like...

Interviewing the turbulent recent events in China with her own personal life story and those of family, friends, and acquaintances, the author creates an evocative portrait of China and its people

A deeply reported investigation into the battle over identity in China, chronicling the state oppression of those who fail to conform to Xi Jinping's definition of who is "Chinese," from an award-winning NPR correspondent.In the hot summer months of...

The astonishing story of the billionaire businessman Jimmy Lai who became one of Hong Kong’s leading activists for democracy and is today China’s most famous political prisoner.Jimmy Lai escaped mainland China when he was twelve years old, at the height...

"Was the bombing offensive [against civilians in Germany and Japan] a crime against humanity," writes A. C. Grayling, "or was it justified by the necessities of war? These questions mark one of the great remaining controversies of the Second World War."...

A gripping investigation into the mysterious assassination of a journalist in India, revealing the courage and vulnerability of those who are fighting the decline of democracy around the worldWhen Gauri Lankesh, an outspoken journalist in the South...

A bold retelling of the origins of contemporary Hinduism, and an argument against the long-established notion of religious reform.By the early eighteenth century, the Mughal Empire was in decline, and the East India Company was making inroads into the...

After Liberation In 1945, Koreans Erupted With Hopes For Reform That Had Been Bottled Up During Forty Years Of Japanese Imperial Rule. Arguing That Permanent North-south Division Was Far From Inevitable, Kornel Chang Explores The Movement For A Unified...

A captivating biography of one of the world’s greatest adventurers, the itinerant Mughal Princess Gulbadan, based on her long-forgotten memoirLonglisted for the 2024 Cundill History Prize“Ruby Lal coaxes the remarkable Gulbadan out from the shadows of...

This “comprehensive, judicious, and finely detailed” (Roderick MacFarquhar, The New York Review of Books) biography of Mao Zedong traces how he created a totalitarian government even more destructive and extreme than Stalin’s, while transforming China...

The emotionally wrenching yet ultimately uplifting memoir of a Chinese woman struggling to win the love and acceptance of her family.Born in 1937 in a port city a thousand miles north of Shanghai, Adeline Yen Mah was the youngest child of an affluent...

• A series of 10 masterpieces of calligraphy from famous masters of different Chinese dynasties, presented in the traditional format of a handscrollIn the series Collection of Ancient Calligraphy and Painting Handscrolls: Calligraphy, 10 masterpieces...

• A series of masterpieces of calligraphy from famous masters of two Chinese dynasties, presented in the traditional format of a handscroll• Includes important postscripts and observations of the works from later generationsThe series contains a...