Rating: 
Summary: A Suitable Overview
Review: I picked this volume up while browsing the stacks at a book chain that shall remain nameless, and it has been my morning coffee reading for the last while. As several of the reviewers have noted, presenting the history of a place as large and as ancient and as complex as India is a daunting task and one that is extremely difficult to do in a single volume. That Keay focuses on the political and dynastic elements of Indian history was certainly a conscious choice on his part. I too would have liked to have seen a greater concentration on the cultural life of the subcontinent, particularly the development of Hinduism, Buddhism, and Jainism, the latter especially being a subject of which I know virtually nothing. I realize, however, that to do justice to the subject(s) would have meant creating a multi-volume history, something that the author (not to mention his publisher) was probably not prepared to do. Keay's narrative picks up steam in the second millenium A.D., largely because of the vastly increased number of written accounts available to the historian after about AD 1000. I admit that the profusion of dynasties can be confusing, but the timelines and dynastic family trees that Keay provides are immensely helpful, as are the large number of maps scattered throughout the text. Much of the dryness that other reviewers have commented on comes, I think, from the shear volume of material that Keay tries to juggle. Keay has a dry wit that comes through occasionaly, especially when he discusses particular individuals and their idiosyncracies. "India: A History" is a decent primer for a huge subject. Like any sampler, it should serve to direct the interested reader to more focussed sources. For those who are satisfied with a taste of India, this adequately fits the bill.
Rating: 
Summary: Seems to Avoid the Hard Questions of Modern Times
Review: I was glad to read that this history professed to focus on modern, post-colonial India, but was disappointed to find that in fact the author seemed to shy away from the difficult questions about modern India - I mean that particular side of India a visitor can't help noticing alongside all the wonderful sights and sounds - the side which is proverbial with poverty, inept government and inefficiency. Keay doesn't seem to want to face this squarely at all, and his analysis relies too much on causes relegated to the past - The British, for example, who left India half a century ago. I would have liked the author to have dealt with the question of responsibilty for India's woes as it pertained to her current (and post-independance) leaders. But this difficult issue is flubbed, I felt. Perhaps it's too difficult to talk about. But I found V.S. Naipaul much more on the mark on this theme in his three books on India (at least they accorded well with my own observations, much more than Keay's down-playing). Naipual's three wonderful books are An Area of Darkness; India - A Wounded Civilization; and India - A Million Mutinies Now. I highly recommend as companions (or substitutes) to this a-little-too-benign history.
Rating:
Summary: Exhaustive chronology, but slightly dry and overwhelming
Review: I'm not sure I have a lot to add to the reviews already written other than to agree with certain important points to consider for those thinking of buying this book.
1) The history of India not only as a nation but as a region is what this book attempts to tackle - and that is a very long history, one peopled by many cultures, eras, individuals, ethnicities, etc., and to do so in a single volume is a task for which the term daunting strikes me as an understatement. This book is a good attempt at that, but it's not without its faults, to be sure.
2) The scope of the book means that Keay must include so many details just to maintain the integrity of his chronology that at times, I found myself having to read the same three pages repeatedly to try and figure out just what the succession of events was that he was trying to describe. Extrapolate that over entire chapters, and you can begin to get a sense of how much information Keay has packed into this book.
3) His writing is, at times, a bit dry - again, that's likely b/c it's tough to spend a lot of time with lengthy descriptions of every single event/individual when you're covering so much ground, but having said that, I think he does a pretty good job nonetheless.
I frankly think that this is a book best digested in portions - a chapter here, a chapter there, rather than as a single read, unless you are already somewhat familiar with all the periods covered therein (I wasn't). I find that I get more out of the book on successive reads - if I'm reading another book that deals with, for example, the Hellenistic period in the Mediterranean, then I can turn to this book to read about the corresponding period in the subcontinent, and I think that I appreciate what I am reading more than when I first attempted to plow through Keay's work cover to cover.
Rating:
Summary: Well written, open, and scientific.
Review: In my opinion, history should be written in a scientific manner; for archealogy is a science and so are the interpretations of its findings. (Histories of the past -- and unluckily some of them in our age -- have particularly suffered from a rather unscientific appoach.) Keay discusses at many points, scientifically, as to why he chooses a particular interpretation over the others. And as such, this book is a good text on how historians piece together events of the past. This is particuarly important since the current political, cultural, and religious evironments tend to distort the past for their own ends. True historians should strive to be above these biases. Falsifying history and inventing the past have not only been the wont of the modern radicals but have also been done in the past by other peoples of the world -- and in India too. With contradictory pieces of information a historian weighs and distills out the interpretation thatis strongly supported by evidence. Keays reports the history, and gives reasons for it; which was a delight for me. However, I should mention that he suffers from the same biases -- as we, the readers do -- when reporting about the events of the past few decades. The last few pages unviel his biases that have at places conflicted with mine; and I would dare to suggest, would with yours too. I felt he was on firmer ground reporting about India before the partition than reporting about the current events; he lamented himself in the book that a historian loses his place when he leaves the comfort of the past and walks along side the pedestrants. (Yes, I am a pedestrant too.) All together an excellent book on India's history and its ancient civilization. A book to read -- an educating refreasher, if you will -- even if you know about Indian history already.
Rating:
Summary: India: Who Ruled Where and When
Review: India has five thousand years of history that we have enough evidence to write about. Any book that can simply be coherent and readable while covering so much ground is an achievement. John Keay's "India: A History" is more than that, though; it is superbly-written and powerfully narrated. Keay notes in the introduction that he has deliberately avoided focusing more on recent history than on ancient: "a history which reserves half its narrative for the 19th and 20th centuries may seem more relevant, but it can scarcely do justice to India's extraordinary antiquity." Naturally the availability of more historical sources does increase the attention paid to recent events, but still the Raj does not appear till nearly three quarters of the way through, and the 20th century and the real start of the struggle for independence is close to the end of the book. The result is a long, thoughtful and detailed telling of many of the dynasties and civilization that flourished in India -- though, as Keay also says in the introduction, only the highlights are mentioned, since "with perhaps 20 to 40 dynasties co-existing within the subcontinent at any one time, it would be [. . .] sado-masochism [to include them all]". So even at this extra level of detail there has been substantial editing. And there could have been more; the book's only fault is that Keay mentions just too many of the endless dynastic dramas. The essence of a one-volume history is selective editing, and the book could have been shorter and a little less dry in places. However, the picture of India that emerges is deep, complex and fascinating, from the earliest Harappan archaeological relics through to the Gandhis. The Raj is of course particularly interesting: although technologically and industrially the British clearly surpassed them greatly at the time of the Raj, some of the diplomatic exchanges that Keay retails show the Indians as being more sophisticated, more civilized, and in many ways just smarter than the British. It was inevitable that the yoke would be thrown off; the only question was what India would be able to do with its independence. Keay's prose is also a great pleasure; he has a wonderfully dry sense of humour, and he conveys exciting events with panache but also with precision and clarity. Recommended.
Rating:
Summary: Panoramic and well-written
Review: India has five thousand years of history that we have enough evidence to write about. Any book that can simply be coherent and readable while covering so much ground is an achievement. John Keay's "India: A History" is more than that, though; it is superbly-written and powerfully narrated. Keay notes in the introduction that he has deliberately avoided focusing more on recent history than on ancient: "a history which reserves half its narrative for the 19th and 20th centuries may seem more relevant, but it can scarcely do justice to India's extraordinary antiquity." Naturally the availability of more historical sources does increase the attention paid to recent events, but still the Raj does not appear till nearly three quarters of the way through, and the 20th century and the real start of the struggle for independence is close to the end of the book. The result is a long, thoughtful and detailed telling of many of the dynasties and civilization that flourished in India -- though, as Keay also says in the introduction, only the highlights are mentioned, since "with perhaps 20 to 40 dynasties co-existing within the subcontinent at any one time, it would be [. . .] sado-masochism [to include them all]". So even at this extra level of detail there has been substantial editing. And there could have been more; the book's only fault is that Keay mentions just too many of the endless dynastic dramas. The essence of a one-volume history is selective editing, and the book could have been shorter and a little less dry in places. However, the picture of India that emerges is deep, complex and fascinating, from the earliest Harappan archaeological relics through to the Gandhis. The Raj is of course particularly interesting: although technologically and industrially the British clearly surpassed them greatly at the time of the Raj, some of the diplomatic exchanges that Keay retails show the Indians as being more sophisticated, more civilized, and in many ways just smarter than the British. It was inevitable that the yoke would be thrown off; the only question was what India would be able to do with its independence. Keay's prose is also a great pleasure; he has a wonderfully dry sense of humour, and he conveys exciting events with panache but also with precision and clarity. Recommended.
Rating: 
Summary: India's Magnificent Sweeping Epic
Review: India is one of the world's oldest civilizations. John Keay focuses on the centuries after the arrival of the Europeans and British and the social effects of foreign influence. He begins the book in 3000 B.C., then parallels the Aryan invasion and moves through Indian history and sweeps through British rule with critical accounts of British government that are deeply moving and revealing. This book is definitely no apology for British rule. He demonstrates industrial deforestation of India by the British and the social consequences of this and other enviromental and economic actions. He continues on through Ghandi into the modern period and the difficulties of government and leadership in the post-Ghandi period. The books is written with great scholarship, although Mr. Keay's opinions dominate throughout. This books is definitely seen through the author's eyes and is perhaps, less objective than this reader desires, yet the thrilling perspective and colorful sequence of Indian history race through the reader's mind, with clear and beautifully written prose. Highly recommended for general reading. If someone desires greater scholarship, one must go to more specific references, however this is the finest general history of India that I have yet read. In fact, I cannot put the book down.
Rating:
Summary: great detailed history of India
Review: India: A History is a well researched book by JOhn Keay that focuses on the history of the coutnry from 3000 B.C. to the present. He goes through the important stages and events of Indian history such as the Guptas, Mughuls, Hinduism, British rule and the resulting Indian independence movement. There is more than enough information to figure out the history of this complicated country.
Rating:
Summary: Another India
Review: John Keay cruises through five millenia of India's history with verve, humor, and a sharp eye for the details that help bring distant ages to life. I especially like the way he pulls the curtain back on the historical record to discuss the modern feats of discovery, scholarship, and brain-busting translation that made our current knowledge of India's past possible.
Keay's a sensitive interpreter of the socio-cultural side of things, but straight-ahead political history absorbs the larger part of his interest. This may reflect his rather dusty secondary sources, few of which are less than 30 years old. The effect can be tedious as dynasty after dynasty parades across the historical stage and into obscurity. I wish Keay kept a looser grip on chronology and paused more often to consider the wider patterns that gave shape to everyday life and thought. Still, this is a genial and intelligent introduction to the subject that serves up a lot of information with style.
Rating:
Summary: Well and Good
Review: John Keay has written a rather comprehensive and interesting account of the Indo-Pak history. I have brooded over it - and I am still brooding over it... "History repeats itself, historians repeat each other!" (Peter Guedella, Supers and Superman)... but John Keay is careful not to "cherry-pick" facts, examples, arguments; nor does he appear to be some sort of zealot or ideologue...
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