Includes bibliographical references and index.

Machine generated contents note: -- Preface and acknowledgements -- List of illustrations -- Introduction -- Edmund Burke and the Trial of Warren Hastings -- Sir William Jones and the Asiatic Society of Bengal -- Sensibility in a Hot Climate: Literary Culture in Late Eighteenth-Century Calcutta -- The Apostasy of British Orientalism: Sydney Owenson, Lady Morgans The Missionary, Southeys The Curse of Kehama and Maturins Melmoth the Wanderer -- Oriental versus Orientalist Poetry: The Debate in Romantic Period Literary Criticism -- Epilogue: Orientalism under Pressure -- Bibliography -- Index.

"India exerted a powerful grip over the imagination of British authors during the Romantic period. But what was the true nature of their engagement with the Subcontinent? This study argues that depictions of India had to come to terms with India's strangeness and distance from Britain, as well as the aesthetic requirements of European culture"-- Provided by publisher.