| ID | 184789 |
| Title Proper | C.A. Bayly’s Unfinished Business |
| Other Title Information | a History of Ideas in an Old Manuscript |
| Language | ENG |
| Author | Chaturvedi, Vinayak |
| Summary / Abstract (Note) | The purpose of this essay is to introduce C.A. Bayly’s ‘The Spirits of Europe and India’s Twentieth Century’, a paper that was written in 2011 for a workshop at Stanford University titled ‘Civility at the Limit of the Political’. The paper was circulated to the workshop participants and discussed, but it was largely forgotten. The following year Bayly’s Recovering Liberties (2012) was published as part of Cambridge University Press’ ‘Ideas in Context’ series, and I am assuming that his priority was elsewhere—and for good reason. He had once told me that he normally gave himself a day or two to recover after finishing a book before embarking on his next project. He explained that it was often difficult to start writing after taking a break, so the best thing to do was continue writing. I doubt that this was the full story, especially as anyone who knew Bayly’s work patterns also knew that he was involved in multiple writing projects at the same time. At one point I had asked him how many books he had researched or planned. He said my question was a difficult one but reflected that the most accurate answer was four. He added a caveat that he was also preparing for projects in what he anticipated were going to be his ‘declining years’ in which he could sit in his room in St. Catherine’s College or at the Centre of South Asian Studies in Cambridge without having to travel to archives. On 18 April 2015, Bayly died in Chicago, where he held the Vivekananda Visiting Professorship at the University of Chicago. |
| `In' analytical Note | South Asia: Journal of South Asian Studies Vol. 45, No.1; Feb 2022: p.85-102 |
| Journal Source | South Asia: Journal of South Asian Studies Vol: 45 No 1 |