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For the British after 1857, the Indian Muslim became an almost subhuman creature, to be classified in unembarrassedly racist imperial literature alongside such other despised and subject specimens, such as Irish Catholics or ‘the Wandering Jew’.

— William Dalrymple The Last Mughal (2006)

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More quotes by William Dalrymple

I am writing definitely primarily for an audience who don’t know India.

I am a terrible linguist. It`s a great shame that I have not learnt Urdu and Persian.

Robert Clive was a vicious asset-stripper. His statue has no place on Whitehall. Honouring the man once known as Lord Vulture is a testament to British ignorance of our imperial past.

The current Western puppet Hamid Karzai is from the same sub-tribe as Shah Shuja, who was a British puppet in 1839, It is the same war under slightly different flags.

Zafar always put huge emphasis on his role as a protector of the Hindus and the moderator of Muslim demands. He never forgot the central importance of preserving the bond between his Hindu and Muslim subjects, which he always recognised was the central stitching that held his capital city together.

The Last Mughal (2006)

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Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: William Dalrymple (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.