Spatial Transformation and Colonial Order in J. G. Farrell’s the Siege of Krishnapur

Abstract

J.G. Farrell’s The Siege of Krishnapur (1973), the second novel of his Empire Trilogy, is set in the fictional town of Krishnapur during a four-month siege by the local forces. Inspired by the actual sieges during the Indian Rebellion of 1857 and also drawing from archival materials, the novel recounts the lives of British residents in this colonial outpost and their gradual physical and psychological deterioration under confinement. The cantonment, which was originally designed to represent the spirit and culture of the British, is ultimately reduced to a battleground for survival, emphasizing its original foreignness to the surrounding environment. In this paper, I aim to focus on the representation and reproduction of space through Farrell’s delineation of physical transformation of the cantonment under the siege so as to discuss the failings of colonial project. The colonial and Victorian space as portrayed early in the novel and its subsequent transformation will form the basis of my analysis of politics and aesthetics of spatial representation within the broader historical context. I argue that the Residency compound, and specifically the Residency itself, emerge as the focal point to examine Farrell’s use of spatial organization and objects to underline the fragility, and the inevitable end, of the British authority in India.