Customer Reviews

The Mulberry Empire: A Novel

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Set during the 1830's MULBERRY EMPIRE focuses on the expansion of the British Empire into central Asia. Already holding India as a prized possession, Britain looks beyond the horizon to Afghanistan in hopes of dominating trading and beating the Russians. At the center of the novel is Alexander Burnes, a Scot, who publishes a book about his travel experiences to Kabul that sends literary waves throughout London and beyond and draws attention to the need for expanding the British throne into Afghanistan. Alternating between London and Afghanistan this novel attempts to highlight the historic role of western powers in Asia. Books that fall into the genre of historical fiction are often hit or miss, and MULBERRY EMPIRE falls somewhere in between. Some passages are awe-inspiring while the remainders are downright clunkers. I greatly enjoyed the chapters devoted to London and the character of Charles Masson. Philip Hensher's descriptions of the Season and the upper class bring the characters to life on the page. His metaphors are witty and repeatedly brought a smile to my face. These aspects are the true highlights of this novel. It is unfortunate that the remainder of this book can often be dull and disappointing. Hensher's prose tends to be reminiscent of Victorian-era authors who were often paid by the word and therefore expanded their writing into dreadful details and painful insights. On the cover Hensher is described as a modern-day Dickins and Tolstoy. While the verdict is still out on that claim I have to admit that I was disappointed in THE MULBERRY EMPIRE, and would hesitate recommending it to others.

This is a highly engaging, well written epic. Hensher has produced an absorbing historical fiction of a point in time that has implications for our own times. His story of imperalism in central Asia during the 19th century is a timely commentary on current events. Hensher engages the reader with a broad cast of characters from diverse cultures, and the story interestingly moves among locales in Afghanistan, India, England, and Russia. While the story seems to ramble just somewhat in a few spots, this actually seems intentional as part of the broad sweep of historical events, cultures and people. While the author concedes that the story is loosely based on historical facts, his skill at describing events and locales, creating believable and interesting characters within believable plots, and attention to detail transports the reader into the overall story. This is truly an excellent, literary historical fiction.

An evocative novel of the British Raj, and the disastrous First Afghan War. By using actual participants of the period the author makes the story compelling and factual. The author's description of life in Kabul in the early ninetheen century is most believable.

Ambitious and absorbing, British author Hensher's tale of the British invasion of Afghanistan in 1839 encompasses London "Seasons" and glittering Eastern palaces, dusty Kabul streets and English country estates. It takes place over ten years and, while centering on British explorer Alexander Burnes, shifts points of view among the London upper crust, a Russian emissary/adventurer, a supercilious English journalist, several merchants, Afghanistan's Amir, a homosexual British deserter, various misguided British officers, a brief appearance by a modern-day archaeologist coming upon a field of unburied bones, and more.

Far from being confusing, this plethora of views grounds the novel in its time; a world which not only appears to be, but is, very different to Dost Mohammed, the Amir of Kabul, than it is to the serious and fashionable Bella Garraway, falling in love with Burnes at the height of his London Season, or to Burnes' younger brother on his first passage to India or to a nervous, charismatic Russian with a shadowy past. It's a story full of romance and treachery, politics and intrigue, merchant caravans, intrigue, imperialism and arrogance and war.

The narrative moves at a leisurely pace, opening in Kabul with Burnes, passing his days as a virtual prisoner, awaiting an audience with the Amir Dost Mohammed. He is Britain's eyes and ears - the British are wondering whether the Amir should be replaced by an Afghan leader less hostile to their Indian allies. Impressed by the spare order of the Amir's court, the Afghan leader's canny questions and the welter of strange sensations and smells of Kabul, Burnes writes a book on his Eastern adventures and becomes the toast of London. He wins Bella's heart, but she retires to the country with a secret of her own as he travels East again, already replaced by the next London sensation.

Worried by Russian incursions and influence, the British Governor General moves a massive army, complete with officers' wives, baggage and lapdogs, from the Punjab to Afghanistan. Meanwhile a digression to the Crimea introduces Vitkevich, a brilliant and mysterious Russian soldier, whose concern with serfs and land improvements becomes sidetracked by a trip to Afghanistan where he will share Christmas dinner with Burnes.

And back to the British army for domestic difficulties, social wrangling, desert hunting games and inept diplomacy. Eventually the British reach their goal and settle outside the gates of Kabul to enjoy their victory, blind to the end. The cultural misunderstandings, born of ignorance as well as arrogance, are sympathetically developed, and suggest chilling echoes for the present day.

Hensher's writing is rich and unhurried. He envelops the reader in the feel of a place - it's smells and weather, architecture, clothing and people. Though the characters are many they are well developed. Almost all remain enigmas to some extent, but that is entirely intentional. The narrative draws the reader deep into the subtleties of culture and aggression. Beautifully organized and realized, this epic tale should win Hensher a wide audience.

An astonishing achievement; this is filled with vivid detail, brilliantly realized characters, and a quiet, but unmistakably ominous message for our own miscalculated foreign enterprises. A wonderful novel on many levels!

In 1839, fifty thousand British Army soldiers marched into Afghanistan, quickly capturing the capital of Kabul. Three years later, a solitary English soldier from that force rode out. The rest were killed by the Afghans, who used tactics that the British never saw coming.

Philip Hensher's The Mulberry Empire tells the story of this early encounter between the West and the Muslim forces of the region. But, there is much more. Along with detailing the intricate beliefs and dealings of the region, Hensher contracts his story overseas with the intricate beliefs and dealings of the "upper crust" of British society. The truths that the Upper Ten Thousand held as dogma were believed unfailingly, and it was with unbelief that they realised that there were other beliefs and other cultures in the world that could hold sway, and yes, even defeat their armies.

It is also the story of the men of this time, and the story of their loves. There is Alexander Burnes who spends so much time in the region that it is unimaginable to him to ever live again in England. There is Bella Garraway, the creme of the debutantes the year that he is the rage of "the season", and with whom he falls madly in love. There are Muslim rulers, who tempt the English to be involved in their territorial wars, and then turn savagely on them when they have served the rulers' purposes. There is the grand sweep of history and a light shone on a time and place that few readers have considered before.

I enjoyed this book quite a bit. Nominated for the Booker Prize in 2002, it shines a light on a period of history I didn't know much about, illuminating the reasons why the West is often in conflict with the peoples of the region. This book is recommended for lovers of historical fiction, for those who seek to understand the results actions can have decades later, and for those ready for a rip-roaring trip into the past.

Mulberry Empire is a fictionalized tale with an array of true historical characters. The novel is for the most part following the events that lead to the first Anglo-Afghan war, but includes many sub-plots and characters related to the main players in London, Petersburg, or Kabul. Thus the story in each chapter could to some extent stand alone on its own. What is truly interesting is that most of the characters are real people and Hensher has given them a new life, sometimes exaggerating and fabricating a life for them. The interesting Charles Masson's character for example, is depicted rightly as an army deserter and amateur archeologist, but in fact he did not murder a fellow soldier, and was not a homosexual (Philip Hensher confesses to this in his afterwords, and apologizes from any descendants of Masson.) Some true events are altered slightly, and some fascinating pieces are astonishingly true, for example the British officer who had a vision of a funeral procession before the Indus army pushed over to Afghanistan. All in all, though somewhat non-focused, this is an interesting work of fiction and very well written.

How good is this book? Sadly, not as good as it might have been. Too many situations are left unresolved; too many characters crop up too late in the action; and, most surprising in the work of a previously published novelist, there is far too much amateurish "telling," and precious little vital "showing."
Literary shortcomings here consist of an excess of passivity, a tendency to begin sentences with "It", and a narrative voice that is pretty much generic Brit-Lit; nowhere in the book does the writing call out, "This, this, is Philip Hensher -- no one but he could have written this book." Hensher's background in journalism insures his indefatigability, but inflicts serious harm upon his prose style. Characters approach three-dimensionality but, in almost every case, fall short of complete fleshiness (the exception being one Masson, a British Army deserter with a taste for boys and other beautiful objects). A slew of Russian characters appear and disappear, leaving not so much as a ripple on the surface. Murders happen, dogs are shot, atrocities alleged, yet repercussions are in short supply or simply nonexistent. One thinks of slightly above-average TV fare -- a second-tier PBS costume drama, for example -- in which sense counts for less than appearances.
Much of "Mulberry" is praiseworthy -- Hensher's evocation of the landscape, for example, his occasional comic turns among the Governor General's party, his portrayal of a stoic unwed mother in the Gloucestershire gloom -- yet overall the novel projects a plodding quality, a sense of work to be got through, rather than a delight to be savored by the mind and senses. Hensher's pace is leisurely and diffident, hardly a virtue in a historical novel, with exciting events tending to take place off-camera. Intoning, in leaden fake-Islamic tones, ÒAnd the snow was crimson with blood,Ó is no substitute for the actual battle that has been looming for four hundred and forty pages. The reader may well feel justifiable frustration.
If you are interested in the "Great Game," the 19th century power struggle over Afghanistan between Russia and Great Britain, this novel will provide you with a great deal of information; on the other hand, since the author assures us in his Afterword that we have just read "a pack of lies," you will probably learn more from a good history. If you want to read an incandescent novel, a superb work of the imagination, "The Mulberry Empire" most emphatically should not be your first choice.

The Mulberry Empire is one of the more interesting fiction novels I have read recently. I enjoyed the rather languid style and the vauely Dickensian method of description that creates a vivid world for the story to exist within. However, having set the novel up nicely Hensher fails to execute the story in anything approaching a satisfactory style, the storytelling and prose(for my mind) become too detatched, even more so than in the more wandering parts of the book.

However, during the building stage of the book hensher uses some interesting ideas, the vast numbers of complex but ultimately fairly transitory characters and the succession of small apparently unimportant events, with no consequences for the story gave a good feeling for the total lack of importance of any one creature within the Great Game and I felt the rather sad tone was quite condemning of this. Perhaps Hensher uses this as a metaphor for the whole of life, to be honest I really don't know, but it's woth pondering.

For those looking for excitement I wouldn't necessarily recommend this, but for those looking to wallow in a meandering and thoughtful book this is a worthwhile read and I hope you enjoy it.

Hensher tells a forgotten story of British arrogance and foolhardiness and in the process brings the high lands of Afghanistan, Jalalabad, and Peshawar as well as the agricultural paradise of the Crimea to life. Along the way we learn of intrigues in Victorian London and at the Russian court, and we are forced to compare the petty social strictures of England with the brilliance, energy and life of the Afghan kings. Hensher uses historical fact in a masterful way and turns the reader's sympathies 180 degrees without the reader noticing. The apparent heroes of the first part of the book are the villains and fools of the latter part. And we are once again reminded that no-one who tries to invade Afghanistan lives to tell the tale. At some point the Christian West will stop trying.