SUMMARY:

Inspired by Choi Chatterjee’s “Manifesto,” Krishan Kumar tells a history of a few generations in his family that encompasses pre- and postliberation India, pre- and postindependence Trinidad, England, and the United States. He calls himself a child of empire and characterizes the experiences of the generations of his family members as common to many subjects of the British Empire – Indians, Africans, Chinese, and of course Englishmen, Scots, Welsh, and Irish. For all their important differences, they have all shared a common “Britannic” identity, cultural as well as political. From this perspective, Kumar identifies with all imperial subjects, including Englishmen, who had to reinvent an identity for themselves after the empire. He also finds himself personally engaged with questions about the meaning of Englishness that are currently debated in connection with the UK decision to leave the European Union. Kumar explores possible answers to this question, from a postcolonial rejection of mimicry to an embracing of the reality of multilayered identities.