The Glass Palace
Amitav Ghosh
Contributed by Thurman Rieser
Chapter 10-12
Summary

Every year, Rajkumar spends a few days on the giant rafts made from bound tree trunks that float down the rivers. Occasionally, he watches the laborers of Yenangyaung at work as they drag up petroleum from the ground. Each year, he sees more and more white men near the oil fields. Rajkumar wants to buy his own timber yard but lacks the capital. To raise the funds, he borrows money from Saya John and begins to bring workers from India to work the Burmese oil fields with a man named Baburao. In a few years, he believes, he will have enough to buy his own timber yard.

Baburao travels from village to village, offering people the chance to work. They sign up dozens of men and ship them to Burma, taking a cut of each man’s wages. After watching Baburao in action, Rajkumar sets up his own operation. After his first trip, he indentures fifty-eight people and earns enough to pay off Saya John’s loan.

After three years and eight trips, Rajkumar borrows again from Saya John and, along with Doh Say, purchases his own timber yard in Rangoon. Every day, the semi-retired Saya John visits with a caged bird under his arm. Rajkumar hatches a plan to win a large contract from a railway company and brings in Saya John to handle the paperwork. After buying a new suit and making friends with a clerk at the company’s office, Rajkumar and Saya John attend a meeting. Before entering, Saya John notices that Rajkumar has entirely grown up, so much so that he barely recognizes the young boy anymore. Rajkumar asks for Saya John’s blessing, which is happily provided.

Uma receives a letter from her uncle in Rangoon. Inside is a request from Rajkumar to the collector–he would like an audience with the royal family. By this time, Rajkumar is a well-known businessman in Rangoon, having won the contract with the railway company. The collector is reticent and unwilling to grant the meeting at first, explaining that the king is the only one who might threaten British rule in Burma. After Uma pleads and suggests that the meeting will be for Dolly’s benefit, the collector agrees. Rajkumar will be the collector’s personal guest in Ratnagiri.

With a large entourage, Rajkumar travels to Ratnagiri by steamer. Uma has organized a meal that evening and has invited the local police superintendent and Dolly. At the collector’s house, Rajkumar recognizes Dolly at once and is taken aback. He was not expecting to see her so soon.

They sit down to dinner. Rajkumar tells the guests of how he came to be in Mandalay by accident. He recounts the sacking of the palace but before he can reveal that the girl he met was Dolly, she interrupts and suggests that Rajkumar took pleasure in the rioting. Offended, Rajkumar cuts his story short. Before Uma can reassure him, she knocks a knife to the floor and is mortified by her clumsiness. Annoyed at her husband’s sardonic comments, she flicks the replacement knife into the air. Rajkumar catches it before it can hit the floor.

Before anyone can question what has happened, an urgent message is delivered by stagecoach. The collector has been summoned by the Queen–both Dolly and Uma know that she intends to announce the princess’s pregnancy. As the collector departs, the other guests make their excuses and leave. Dolly stands at an open window, thinking of the princess. Rajkumar approaches, speaking her name aloud. Dolly refuses to admit that they met on that fateful night. She tells him to leave, that he has wasted his time, and then bids him goodnight.

The queen receives the collector in her usual fashion. She informs him that the princess will give birth and that the child will be a bastard, telling him to announce the news. The collector is hesitant, fearing for the royal family’s reputation and how this will reflect on him. The queen responds that the true scandal is the treatment of her family and that she does not care that the blame will fall at his feet. The collector passes Sawant’s room as he exits the compound, hearing a woman’s voice within. At home, he asks Uma what she knew. Dolly is asleep in a separate room. Uma sobs as the collector asks repeatedly why she did not share what she knew.

Analysis

Chapter 10 contains the first real example of intra-Asian discord, treated separately from the imperialism imposed by the British. The Indian workers imported into Burma by Rajkumar and others like him will form a lingering resentment in the local communities. As the Burmese economy collapses, the locals will turn on these imported workers and chase them out of the country. Rajkumar, a man who made his life in Burma and considers it his home, will be unable to understand why he is not treated as a Burmese person–he is treated as an Indian, even if he knows nothing of his home country. This racial determinism will be evidenced time and time again in the novel and will cause friction between Uma and Rajkumar.

It is in Chapter 12 that the author reveals Uma’s true nature. The hints of her rebelliousness are becoming more evident. She hides information from her husband, and when he embarrasses her in front of dinner guests, she throws a knife in the air. Her willingness to contravene and shatter social norms will become a repeated theme throughout the text as she turns her attention from her marriage to the question of Indian independence.

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