Critique: Zemindar (Valerie Fitzgerald)

 Laura, an English woman, is accompanying her newly-married cousin Emily to colonial India. Oliver, a relative of Emily’s husband Charles, is a zemindar (one of the many Indian feudal titles) and Charles wants to convince Oliver to make him his heir. During their trip they get caught up in the war.

 

******SPOILERS*****

 

There were many positive points.

Punctuation is essentially perfect. Considering this book is over 800 pages long, there should statistically be far more mistakes than the average-sized novel. Yet, somehow, there are far less. The only one that was glaringly obvious is writing ‘Out-ram’ instead of ‘Outram’ on a single occasion.

Laura saves the son of Wajid Khan from a stampede. In return, Khan gives Laura a rakhri, a beautiful jewelled token. If she returns it with a request to Khan, he is obligated to respond. Having this detail is nice foreshadowing for something important. This gave the plot some direction (other than the romance) whilst the scene was still being set.

Laura hears Charles raping Emily. This was hard to read but only because it was written so well that it felt like I was hearing it happen in real life.

Twice we had specific plot points that made me smile. Moti helps Emily give birth so Emily names her daughter Pearl (which is what Moti means). Emily, Laura and Charles wear a burqha to hide that they are white whilst escaping to the Residency.

Oliver tells Laura that if she loved him she’d stay on India. Yet he doesn’t consider the reverse, that if he loved her he’d leave for England. This accurately portrays how these ultimatums are thought out in real life.

 

Often, the behaviour of the characters felt off. Either their actions/thoughts made no sense whatsoever or their thoughts/actions were simply out of character.

Laura appreciates that Oliver is frank. Then, whilst comparing Oliver and Charles, she complains that Oliver isn’t as frank like Charles. So that’s a bit iffy. But then later on, Laura goes on about Oliver being frank again! If Oliver’s behaviour changed then this flip-flopping would be justifiable, but it didn’t so it isn’t.

Laura loves Charles, even after he rapes Emily. Emily, who is much more than a cousin to Laura. How can you love someone who does something so horrible to someone you love even more?

Emily married Charles just so that Laura wouldn’t get married first. Really? I don’t believe anyone from any time period would do that.

I wasn’t ready for Mr Robert’s suicide. The author didn’t convince me that he felt romantic love for another character. A strong platonic bond, sure, but not romance. His declaration for love was entirely out of place. It seemed like the author just had no further use for the character. Also, it’s as if the author wanted to redeem Emily, showing she’s not stupid because she spotted Robert’s feelings whilst Laura did not.

 

Once at the Residency, Laura goes on this massive rant about how she’s ‘shallow, self-contained, selfish girl’.

I don’t see how. She always cares for others first and puts their desires above her own. Nothing in Laura’s behaviour can be twisted into her being selfish etc. Even if people have a bad opinion about themselves, they’d have reasons for it (most of the time, these ‘reasons’ would be wrong/misinterpreted/misconstrued). Laura lacks any such reasons.

There’s no hint of Laura having a negative opinion about herself before this point. Considering the book’s written in first person, there’s no excuse for this.

 

The siege at Lucknow went on FOREVER. It got a bit dull, to be honest. There was a lot of repetition that did nothing for the plot. It became more like a shopping list than a story.

Whilst in the Residency, they complain that the rains have gone on for two and a half months. Yet a little later they say they’ve been besieged for three weeks. Two and a half months is far longer than three weeks, making this a glaring inconsistency.

One could argue it could have been raining since before the siege began. But if this were the case, the rains would have been mentioned as Laura and co travelled to the Residency. Was this the case? No. Hence the glaring inconsistency remains.

The blurb says nothing about the siege. Now, I think important plot points should be kept off the blurb: an author spends time trying to shock/surprise their readers so blurbs ruining it is disrespectful.

However, the siege lasted more than half the total pages of this book. That’s at least four hundred pages (which is larger than most novels!) This means the blurb doesn’t give an accurate account or summary of the novel. There are many ways the blurb could have mentioned getting caught in the unrest without revealing the siege directly.

 

This was a good book. It was sprinkled with Indian culture here and there which made it interesting. The negatives, whilst plentiful, weren’t a threat to the plot’s integrity.

This book shows great insight into how British people perceived India during the colonial era. It provides insight into how and why history unfolded as it did. This is a necessity if the mistakes of the past aren’t to be repeated.

Whilst the siege was a struggle to read, the first half of the book (where Laura explores Indian culture) were so easy and enjoyable. I feel like someone could read up to the siege and end it there. Except important, interesting things do happen during the siege and after it too. If the siege had been shorter, it would have been far more bearable.

Unfortunately, as it is, I wouldn’t want to read this book again. Once is enough to enjoy the plentiful positivity and best punctuation ever seen in literature.