THE LAFAYETTE STUDIO AND PRINCELY INDIA By Russell Harris Roli Price: Rs 395 Pages: 95

If India's erstwhile royalty were paid a commission for every book written on their lives and extravagances, they would be wallowing in opulence instead of converting palaces into hostelries. This book, however, is about another sort of commission: the studio portrait. The Lafayette photography studio, one of the oldest and most historic in the world, specialised in high-society portraits during its peak: the early part of the last century. It prompted a panoply of Indian royals to head to Bond Street to be photographed in all their ceremonial finery.

ROYAL FLUSH: Jindan and Hilda

This collection of portraits, which brings to life a lost imperial past, was almost lost to posterity itself. A worker clearing out a London attic in 1968 stumbled across a pile of discarded glass plates which turned out to be the priceless archives of the Lafayette Studio. Another 20 years passed before the negatives were handed over to the Victoria & Albert Museum to be restored and catalogued. London, of course, was the favourite destination of Indian royalty and they sat for official portraits at the Lafayette Studio. These black-and-white prints and the fascinating history behind them are meticulously researched by author/scholar Russell Harris.

All the royals have been shot in the studio, some with distinctly Indian backdrops, except for Gaekwad of Baroda who is on horseback on a London street. There are some historical portraits too: like the one taken in 1899 of the little-known but beautiful princesses Bamba Sophia Jindan and Catherine Hilda, daughters of Duleep Singh, the last maharaja of Punjab and owner of the legendary Kohinoor diamond. The anglicised names are probably because their mother was the daughter of a German banker and a Coptic Christian slave from Abyssinia.

The book, though dominated by the portraits of royalty, is essentially about the Lafayette Studio and its photographic innovations. What is missing are the portraits of the Gwalior royals and those from Rajasthan, perhaps the most flamboyant in dress and demeanour. They clearly felt Bond Street had more to offer by way of baubles to buy rather than climb three flights of stairs to have their photographs taken. Despite such omissions, this book adds a pictorially important chapter to the chronicle of princely India.

Epic Misadventure

The vrooming Valmiki of the times shifts to the slow lanes in Chitrakoot

By Geeta Doctor

THE DEMONS OF CHITRAKOOT: BOOK THREE OF THE RAMAYANA By Ashok K. Banker Penguin Price: Rs 350 Pages: 615

In Book Three of the Ramayana, Ashok Banker is so sure of himself in his role as a New-Age seer that he takes the most charismatic character entirely off the scene. The rumour is that Ravana is dead.

Banker has all the time in the world to dish out his brand of pious popcorn as he describes the events that mark the triumphal entry of the princes of Ayodhya to their capital with their brides, amid scenes of celebration. All is not well because Kaikeyi, the second wife of king Dasaratha, is determined to have her son Bharat on the throne. It is no doubt a severe case of post-menopausal stress, but in Kaikeyi it manifests as a dependence on the green-eyed witch-woman Manthara. This is followed by a swift turn of fortune as Rama, the first born, is forced to leave the palace with Sita by his side. Lakshman, or Luck as his "bhai" calls him, insists on following them to 14 years of exile. The palace is in a state of turmoil particularly because Dasaratha has been dealt the coup de grace by his favourite by one final tumble in the bed. It is as familiar and oddly reassuring as listening to the rambling of a garrulous Mumbai cab driver.

Come to think of it, Banker's story-telling mode is remarkably like that of a cab driver. He takes the longest route to get to any place. By the end of Book Three, we are still stuck in Chitrakoot. When he decides to dish the dirt on the bad girls, whether they are Manthara, Surpanakha or Kaikeyi, he chews them out like wads of betel nut and makes them reek with distasteful emissions. He changes gears between good and evil, lurches to a stop for special effects and is continually turning back to reassure his readers: "I am the va-va vroom Valmiki of my time, dost."