Classical India   |   READING AND TRAVEL GUIDE

Here's a page from Longitude, the specialty bookseller for travelers. To order online, and to see the latest, most comprehensive selection of books and maps, go to http://reading.longitudebooks.com/B49772. You may also call 800-342-2164 to order or request a catalog.


Essential Books These 5 items are available for $95, including
U.S. shipping, a 15% discount (Item no. EXIDA310)		  
Eyewitness Guide India  •  Eyewitness Guides
GUIDEBOOK •  2011 •  PAPER  • 824 PAGES
A handsome, beautifully illustrated guide to India. It features color photographs, history and plenty of background information. (IDA265, $30.00)		   Eyewitness Guide India
India  •  Stanley Wolpert
HISTORY •  2009 •  PAPER  • 281 PAGES
A wonderfully literate introduction to India by the acknowledged master. Author of 14 books and a professor of history since 1958, Wolpert distills a tremendous amount of information in this detailed overview, tackling the environment, religion and philosophy, the arts and sciences, domestic and foreign policy and culture. (IDA04, $24.95)		   India
Taj Mahal  •  Giles Tillotson  •  Mary Beard
ART & ARCHITECTURE •  2008 •  HARD COVER  • 190 PAGES
This pocket book in Harvard's Wonders of the World series is a guide and witty meditation on the place of the Taj Mahal in the cultural imagination of India and the wider world. An art historian, Tillotson demolishes myths about the structure ("the queen of architecture"), its history and meaning. (IDA528, $19.95)		   Taj Mahal
City of Djinns: A Year in Delhi  •  William Dalrymple
CULTURAL PORTRAIT •  2003 •  PAPER  • 350 PAGES • FAVORITE
A year's sojourn in Old Delhi provides the springboard for a brilliant ramble through several thousand years of the city's history; architecture, art and literature are leavened and lightened by a mixture of the author's daily life. Any visitor will see a Delhi, New and Old, with fresh eyes after walking through the crowds on Chandni Chowk with the incomparable Dalrymple as guide. (IDA06, $16.00)		   City of Djinns: A Year in Delhi
India Map  •  ITMB
2009 •  MAP
A double-sided shaded relief map of India at the excellent scale of 1:2,100,000, printed on tear and waterproof paper. With an index, it shows major roads, rivers, and locations of national parks. Two Sides. 27x40 inches. (IDA18, $12.95)		   India Map



Also Recommended

Culture Smart! India  •  Becky Stephen   • GUIDEBOOK  •  A concise, well-illustrated guide to both social and business customs in India. (IDA298, $9.95)
 		  
Eyewitness Guide Delhi, Agra and Jaipur  •  Anuradha Chaturvedi   • GUIDEBOOK  •  With chapters on Taj Mahal, Amber Fort Palace, Keoladeo Ghana National Park, Red Fort and dozens of other highlights for the traveler, this compact, gorgeously illustrated guide to Delhi and its environs features 900 color photographs, maps and site plans. (IDA151, $25.00)
 		  
Love Delhi  •  Fiona Caulfield   • GUIDEBOOK  •  Packaged in very fashionable locally woven cloth, this beautifully made, discerning guide captures the soul of the city, pointing with authority to neighborhoods, shops, markets, restaurants and attractions. A labor of love by the Bangalore-based Fiona Caulfield and friends. Third edition. (IDA403, $50.00)
 		  
Love Mumbai  •  Fiona Caulfield   • GUIDEBOOK  •  This beautifully made, affectionate guide, packaged in its own satchel of locally woven cloth or khadi and printed on hand-made paper, captures the soul of the city, pointing with authority to neighborhoods, shops, markets, restaurants and attractions. 3rd Edition. (IDA389, $50.00)
 		  
In Spite of the Gods, The Strange Rise of Modern India  •  Edward Luce   • HISTORY  •  Luce tackles the challenges and reality of the world's largest democracy with insight and balance in this portrait of a nation in transition. (IDA349, $16.00)
 		  
May You Be the Mother of a Hundred Sons, A Journey Among the Women of India  •  Elisabeth Bumiller   • CULTURAL PORTRAIT  •  A wonderfully written and fascinating portrayal of Indian women from Bollywood stars to Indira Gandhi to prostitutes. It's an insightful portrait of the country as seen through the eyes of its women. (IDA37, $14.95)
 		  
The Idea of India  •  Sunil Khilnani   • CULTURAL PORTRAIT  •  Khilnani confronts the complexities, paradoxes and challenges of the nation in this brief, elegant survey of India since independence. (IDA160, $17.00)
 		  
The Last Mughal, The Fall of a Dynasty: Delhi, 1857  •  William Dalrymple   • HISTORY  •  The riveting tale of the poet, mystic and Mughal Emperor Shah Zafar II and mid 19th century Delhi, culminating in the 1857 Indian Rebellion. (IDA350, $17.95)
 		  
Darsan, Seeing the Divine Image in India  •  Diana L. Eck   • ART & ARCHITECTURE  •  Tremendously useful for the traveler, this rigorous guide explains the significance and meaning of Hindu temples, festivals and ritual. Darsan, which translates as "seeing", reveals religious expression in India. (IDA75, $25.00)
 		  
Hindu Art and Architecture  •  George Michell   • ART & ARCHITECTURE  •  An excellent survey of Hindu art and architecture, explaining the meaning and construction of principal images and buildings, as well as the development of Hinduism and the corpus of myths that have influenced its artistic tradition. (IDA147, $18.95)
 		  
Taj Mahal  •  M.C. Joshi  •  Jean-Louis Nou  •  Amina Okada   • ART & ARCHITECTURE  •  This lavish portrait features 158 full-color photographs (including four magnificent foldout panels) by the extraordinary Jean-Louis Nou. With grand exterior views, filigreed inscriptions and bejeweled floral mosaics. (IDA108, $75.00)
 		  
Taj Mahal, Passion and Genius at the Heart of the Moghul Empire  •  Diana Preston  •  Michael Preston   • ART & ARCHITECTURE  •  A vivid narrative history of the creation of the Taj Mahal, a memorial created by Moghul emperor Shah Jahan for his beloved wife. (IDA340, $16.95)
 		  
A Princess Remembers, The Memoirs of the Maharani of Jaipur  •  Devi Gayatri   • BIOGRAPHY/MEMOIR • HARD TO FIND ELSEWHERE  •  The memoirs of an extraordinary life. Widow of the Maharaja of Jaipur, member of parliament and a fascinating character, Gayatri recalls growing up in the palace compound, marrying the Maharaja, her political triumphs and work on behalf of education in India. (IDA149, $39.95)
 		  
An Autobiography, Or the Story of My Experiments with Truth  •  Mohandas K. Gandhi   • BIOGRAPHY/MEMOIR  •  There is no substitute for reading Gandhi in his own simple, direct prose. A highly recommended glimpse into the personality and life of this remarkable figure. (IDA163, $10.95)
 		  
Slowly Down the Ganges  •  Eric Newby   • TRAVEL NARRATIVE  •  In 1963, the author and his wife set out an a 1,200-mile voyage down the Ganges River. The title could apply as easily to the ruminative attitude Newby takes towards his journey as to the many mishaps which bedevil the quest. (IDA179, $18.95)
 		  
A Fine Balance  •  Rohinton Mistry   • LITERATURE • FAVORITE  •  Set in Indira Gandhi's "Emergency Raj" of 1975 in an unnamed Indian "city by the sea," which bears a striking resemblance to Bombay, this tender novel follows the intermingled fortunes of a Parsi widow, her boarder and two tailors. (IDA92, $17.00)
 		  
Beneath a Marble Sky, A Love Story  •  John Shors   • LITERATURE  •  Built to mourn the tragic death of the emperor's wife, the Taj Mahal is at the center of this murderous, fantastical and dazzling tale, told from the point of view of daughter Princess Jaharana. (IDA301, $15.00)
 		  
Kim  •  Rudyard Kipling   • LITERATURE  •  For the sheer pleasure of its prose, insight into the British in India and its extraordinary sense of place, you can't do better than Kipling's classic novel about a boy who travels the Grand Trunk Road with the Dalai Lama. (IDA65, $9.00)
 		  
Midnight's Children  •  Salman Rushdie   • LITERATURE • FAVORITE  •  Crowned Best of the Booker in 2008, Rushdie's greatest novel is a madcap, comic take on the birth of modern India in all its splendid and unexpected manifestations. (IDA12, $16.00)
 		  
The White Tiger, A Novel  •  Aravind Adiga   • LITERATURE  •  Mordant, funny, angry, horrifying, this Booker Prize-winning tale of a village pauper turned success (and murderer) skewers the ambition, inequity and corruption of 21st-century India. (IDA542, $15.00)
 		  
Birds of India  •  Richard Grimmett  •  Carol Inskipp  •  Tim Inskipp   • FIELD GUIDE  •  Thoroughly revised, with 73 new plates and many others updated or repainted, the second edition of the masterful Birds of India now features all maps and text opposite the plates for quicker and easier reference. (FG43, $39.50)
 		  
 
www.longitudebooks.com     (800) 342-2164      115 West 30th St., Suite 1206    New York, NY 10001