A Division of the Spoils
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| Author | Paul Scott |
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| Country | United Kingdom |
| Language | English |
| Genre(s) | Historical, Novel |
| Publisher | Heinemann |
| Released | 5 May 1975 |
| Media type | Print (Hardback & Paperback) |
| Pages | 640 pp (hardback edition) |
| ISBN | ISBN 0-434-68111-3 (hardback edition) |
| Preceded by | The Towers of Silence |
| Followed by | Staying On |
A Division of the Spoils is the 1975 novel by Paul Scott that concludes his Raj Quartet.
[edit] Plot introduction
The novel is set in the British Raj. It follows on from the storyline in the The Jewel in the Crown, The Day of the Scorpion, and The Towers of Silence. Many of the events are retellings from different points of view of events that happened in the previous novels.
[edit] Explanation of the novel's title
The title, A Division of the Spoils comes from[citation needed] Isaiah 53.12:
- Therefore will I divide him a portion with the great, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong; because he hath poured out his soul unto death: and he was numbered with the transgressors; and he bare the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors.
and[citation needed] Proverbs 16.18-19:
- Pride goeth before destruction, and an haughty spirit before a fall.
- Better it is to be of an humble spirit with the lowly than to divide the spoil with the proud.
[edit] Setting
The story is set in 1945 and 1947 in several locations throughout India, prior to and after Indian independence, particularly in an unnamed British province of India. The province, which is located in northern India, shares characteristics with Punjab and the United Provinces. The names of places and people suggest a connection to Bengal; however, the physical characteristics place the setting in north-central India, rather than in northeast India. The province has an agricultural plain and, in the north, a mountainous region.
The capital of the province is Ranpur. Another large city in the province is Mayapore, which was the key setting in The Jewel in the Crown. The princely state of Mirat is a nominally sovereign enclave within the province. Pankot is a "second class" hill station in the province which serves as a headquarters for the 1st Pankot Rifles, an important regiment of the Indian Army, who fought the Axis in North Africa. During the cool season, the regiment moves to Ranpur, on the plains. At Premanagar there is an old fortification that is used by the British as a prison. Another town, Muzzafirabad is the headquarters of the Muzzafirabad ("Muzzy") Guides, another Indian Army regiment. Other towns in the province are Tanpur and Nansera.
[edit] Plot summary
The story covers in personal terms the humbling and hasty decamping of the British: the precipitant demission of power to a country fiercely bent on division; the travails of an honorable Muslim Congressman, Mohammed Ali Kasim, and his sons, one of whom has deserted to the Japan-directed Indian National Army; the quandary of the Nawab of the small fictitious princely state of Mirat, left in the lurch by the lapse of British Paramountcy; the suicide of a dysentery-debilitated and maladapted British officer; the prowling of the haunted Ronald Merrick. The new man on the scene is Sergeant Guy Perron, once a pupil of a posh public school called Chillingborough which Hari Kumar (as Harry Coomer) also attended when he lived in England. It was he who returned in 1947/8 to be an observer of India on the eve of Independence; this assignment soon turns into a personal inquiry into the truth behind the hushed-up story of Lieutenant-Colonel Ronald Merrick's death in Mirat. The tragic consequences of India-Pakistan Partition are dramatized in a horrific train massacre.
[edit] Characters in "A Division of the Spoils"
[edit] Maj./Lt. Col. Ronald Merrick
[edit] Sgt. Guy Lancelot Percival Perron
Perron serves as an intelligence operative in the Indian Army. He comes from the middle class, having attended Chillingborough and Cambridge University, which is unusual for an enlisted soldier. Perron is a scholar of Indian language and history and uses his time to observe and study.
Perron comes to the attention of
