Giles Tillotson on Delhi's history offers an unusually readable book

Readers tend to view the corpus of books on Delhi as overfamiliar and overcrowded. Indeed, it is unlikely that there is any other city in India or maybe east of Baghdad that has been so subject to scrutiny, analysis and opinion. Delhi is what potboilers are made of. On picking up Giles Tillotson’s Delhi Darshan it’s essential, I think, to keep in mind that there is a significant variance, not in erudition or depth of learning but in style, between our writers and theirs in addressing history and its trappings. By style I mean that the West employs, for the want of a better word, a more user-friendly way of navigating material which our writers believe can take care of itself without any embellishments. We are not talking here of thesis papers nor instant history but something that falls between. A skilful writer and lecturer like Tillotson, in writing Delhi Darshan, is astute enough to add the word “history” to the subtitle of his book,  justifying its forays into chronicle and legend and adding, in the process, immensely to the book’s readability and charm. To him, Delhi’s story is not just stone and marble but about kings and commoners, forever locked in savage conflict or caught in the coils of uneasy peace; this lends his narrative its essence and Delhi’s memorials their human face. It also settles the issue of how such books could be written for an eclectic readership without losing its scholarly identity.

Be that as it may, Tillotson, a quintessential India scholar, is more familiar than most with the teeming scenario of the Delhi chronicles which has over time admitted and keeps on letting in new writing with a fine disregard for privilege. He, therefore, did not need to throw his hat into the ring (and pardon the pedestrianism), except that, after having effectively done Jaipur and the Taj Mahal, he was obliged to conclude his chronicles of the Golden Triangle. This begs the question: How is Tillotson’s book any different from the others? 

To begin with, it’s clear that Tillotson wasn’t writing for an overcrowded library shelf but rather, as he said in a recent interview, “It (the book) is an essay to be read and enjoyed.” Also, our author doesn’t resort to poetic licence. Therefore, his book is devoid of allusions to teardrops on the cheek of time or avoids mulling over how the dust of the interred bones of many kings and courtiers has layered not just Delhi’s soul but its soil over centuries — which is a pity because chances of your walking along a Delhi street and thinking that there could be a bit of Humayun or Ibrahim Lodi underneath you is grist for the poet’s mill. 

On a more perceptible note, Tillotson also sidesteps the tested routine of contrasts to mark out the borders of an argued position. Delhi Darshan establishes clearly that in spite of what many scholars would choose to believe, Delhi is a vast Mussalman necropolis; not so much a city, seven cities if you wish, of forts or stepwells or gardens or towers of remembrance or mosques as of tombs, and the city’s mausoleums, often incorporating some of these features, invariably define its monuments. Hence, one would have expected a comparison, in purely architectural terms, and however ridiculous that would have been, between the ubiquitous tombs of Delhi with the ersatz modern memorials to Gandhi and many of India’s prime ministers et al along the banks of the Yamuna. In fact, one wonders if Tillotson’s denial of the incidence of any Hindu monument — and what else could that be but temples — is merely a quirk of history. 

Monumental story: The book reserves ample space for the majestic Humayun’s Tomb (above); it also mentions how the rapacious Brits blundered with the Qutub Minar

What does get enough space, though, is Humayun’s Tomb and its surrounds; Tillotson is in his element as he slowly pans over the mausoleum and adds an appealing voice-over that probes its history. He debunks the “pious fiction” of a grieving wife’s lament and very clearly states that this first tomb was meant to manifest the power and permanence of the Mughals in India. His narrative style says it all, “First the Mughals come and knock out the Lodis; then the Surs come and knock out the Mughals; then the Mughals come back and knock out the Surs; and now the emperor falls downstairs and is succeeded by a teenager. Perhaps the Surs will stage a comeback. The lofty dome of Humayun’s Tomb lays all such fears to rest along with the emperor. Pushovers don’t build like this.” The book is replete with “quirky details and unique insights”, according to his publisher, and the choicest bits are reserved for the rapacious Brits who blundered with the Qutub Minar, a caustic Edwin Lutyens who frequently disagreed pointlessly with authority and the whole nonsense of pointed arches and the incongruity of Indo-Saracenic architecture; a hodgepodge that tried to explain the Raj’s counterfeit concern for the Indian temper, so evident in the phony politics of the East-to-North shift of capitals. Towards the end, Tillotson offers two bonuses; a chapter that examines Indian architecture’s lifelines and another that details nine Delhi Routes you could take to find out what Tillotson was going on about. Great stuff, this.

In conclusion, to share many of Tillotson’s back stories that underpin his narrative would be to inject needless spoilers in presenting the book. Suffice to say that Delhi Darshan isn’t an airport read, though one does hope, in this instance, for a delayed departure from Delhi airport.

Delhi Darshan
 

The History and Monuments of India’s Capital

Author: Giles Tillotson

Publisher: Penguin/Viking

Pages: 160

Price: Rs 599