Women’s History Month: October 2024 has begun! (In Canada, we mark/ celebrate Women’s History Month in October.) To do my piece and help support female authors, all month I will be sharing books written by women. History and biography in particular seem to still be lacking in female authors, so we are starting with one of my favourite reads of this year. Princess Sophia Duleep Singh began life as Queen Victoria’s goddaughter and ended a dedicated suffragette- she led a fascinating life. For our Book Bite this week, we have Sophia by Anita Anand!
Sophia: Princess, Suffragette, Revolutionary, Anita Anand
In 1876 Sophia Duleep Singh was born into Indian royalty. Her father, Maharajah Duleep Singh, was heir to the Kingdom of the Sikhs, one of the greatest empires of the Indian subcontinent, a realm that stretched from the lush Kashmir Valley to the craggy foothills of the Khyber Pass and included the mighty cities of Lahore and Peshawar. It was a territory irresistible to the British, who plundered everything, including the fabled Koh-I-Noor diamond.
Exiled to England, the dispossessed Maharajah transformed his estate at Elveden in Suffolk into a Moghul palace, its grounds stocked with leopards, monkeys and exotic birds. Sophia, god-daughter of Queen Victoria, was raised a genteel aristocratic Englishwoman: presented at court, afforded grace and favor lodgings at Hampton Court Palace and photographed wearing the latest fashions for the society pages. But when, in secret defiance of the British government, she travelled to India, she returned a revolutionary.
Sophia transcended her heritage to devote herself to battling injustice and inequality, a far cry from the life to which she was born. Her causes were the struggle for Indian Independence, the fate of the lascars, the welfare of Indian soldiers in the First World War – and, above all, the fight for female suffrage. She was bold and fearless, attacking politicians, putting herself in the front line and swapping her silks for a nurse’s uniform to tend wounded soldiers evacuated from the battlefields. Meticulously researched and passionately written, this enthralling story of the rise of women and the fall of empire introduces an extraordinary individual and her part in the defining moments of recent British and Indian history.
Why You Should Read This…
Royal biographies tend to be rather popular- I of all people know that. However, we tend to see the same men and women written about over and over rather than lesser-known lives being brought to the forefront. And Sophia’s life intersects with several significant political and social movements of the twentieth century, making this one of the most informative and captivating biographies I’ve read.
Although a book detailing both the Indian independence movement and the suffragette movement has the possibility to be a textbook and tedious to read. But this biography falls into neither of these categories. Sophia’s unique position as a female member of the aristocracy in Britain as well as the daughter of an Indian ruler makes for a compelling and complex story that few royal lives can match. I appreciated that Anand did not take a worshipful tone towards the British Royal Family, either, as that can very easily happen. (And quite frankly, the BRF were/are multifaceted people who did some problematic things.)
This is a fairly lengthy biography; Sophia lived into her early seventies, and saw several major world conflicts, notable political events, and more. It would not do her life justice to cut it short and this felt like the appropriate amount of space!
I would wholeheartedly recommend this biography to anyone interested in royal history or the suffragette movement, and I would recommend giving yourself to truly read and absorb this.
Is Sophia by Anita Anand on your to-read list?
Cheers,
The Historian
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