The Glass Palace

Ghosh's saga opens in 1885 as the British storm the royal palace at Mandalay and depose the last Burmese king, and follows the orphan Rajkumar, who rises from that day's chaos to a teak fortune, across three generations and three countries. Burma is the heart: the Glass Palace and the sack of Mandalay, and the teak port of Rangoon. Beyond it lie the Indian town of Ratnagiri, where the exiled king is held, and the rubber estates of Malaya where the family's later fortunes are made and broken.

King Thebaw

The Glass Palace, Mandalay

Part 1

British troops take Mandalay and depose King Thebaw and Queen Supayalat, ending the Burmese monarchy and sending the royal family into exile. The looting of the glittering Glass Palace, watched by the orphan boy Rajkumar, is the fall from which the whole three-generation saga unspools.

Part 1

explicit The novel opens with the 1885 British storming of the royal palace at Mandalay, whose mirrored hall gives the book its title; the palace is real, and King Thebaw was the last Burmese monarch deposed there.

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Rajkumar

Mandalay (Rajkumar's start)

Part 1

In the chaos of the sacked city, the orphan Rajkumar catches sight of Dolly, a young maidservant to the queen, and never forgets her. From the streets of Mandalay he sets out to make himself, hitching his fortunes to the teak trade that is opening the Burmese forests to empire.

Part 1

explicit The penniless Indian boy Rajkumar is working at a food stall in Mandalay when the palace falls; the real city is where his rise begins and where he first glimpses the maid Dolly.

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