The Great Game

This history recounts the nineteenth-century contest between British India and Tsarist Russia for influence across Central Asia, from the Caucasus and Persia through the khanates to Afghanistan and Tibet. Hopkirk follows soldiers, surveyors, and unofficial agents who mapped passes, courted emirs, and sometimes vanished in captivity, among them figures such as Alexander Burnes, Arthur Conolly, and later Younghusband. The narrative moves between London, Calcutta, and St Petersburg policy and the deserts and mountains where the work was done. The book is a narrative of imperial rivalry and exploration, not a full history of any one Asian state.

Bound in grey buckram, blocked with a black and gold design by David Eccles. Black slipcase.