Out in the Midday Sun: The British in Malaya 1880-1960

(, New edition)

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The story of British Malaya, from the days of Victorian pioneers to the denouement of independence, is a momentous episode in Britain's colonial past. The British came as fortune-seekers to exploit Asian trade shipped through Penang and Singapore. They found a mature Asian culture in a land of palm-fringed shores and primeval jungle. Like modern Romans, they built townships, defences, communications and hill stations, superimposed their law and established an idiosyncratic political system. They also developed the tin and rubber of the Malay States, encouraging Chinese and Indian immigrants by their open-door policy. The outcome was a vibrant multi-racial society - the most cosmopolitan in the East.

Through memoirs, letters and interviews, Margaret Shennan chronicles the halcyon years, the two World Wars, economic depression and diaspora, revealing the attitudes of the diverse quixotic characters of this now quite vanished world.

Reviews

An exceptional investigation and an engrossing portrait of the Englishman in his topee and pale linen jacket standing firm in the midday sun - The Sunday Times

In her fine book, Margaret Shennan does belated justice to the brave and industrious men and women who gave their best to Malaya - Allan Massie Literary Review

An acute and sometimes poignancy account of the soft, all too vulnerable underbelly of a society tangoing heedlessly towards the abyss of the fall of Singapore: a tragic, classic case of pride before a fall - Charles Allen

Margaret Shennan describes in fascinating detail the often bizarre and not infrequently terrible annals of colonial Malaya - Martin Booth The Sunday Times

Author Bio

Margaret Shennan was born in Kuching, Borneo (now East Malaysia), was brought up in Province Wellesley and went to school in the Cameron Highlands. She is a prize-winning historian and writer, and one of her first books was her childhood autobiography Missee. She lives in Lancaster.