Mr. Ramakrishna's book is picturesque and sympathetic.—Manchester Guardian.
A well-written book, and one which gives a realistic description of a condition of life which is the outcome of centuries of isolation,—Leeds Mercury.
It is not an easy thing to acquire a clear conception of a life and a civilisation other in every respect to our own, and it may be reasonably questioned if one Englishman in a thousand has more than a very vague idea of what life in an Indian village is like. Here is a pleasant and graphic little volume. He may acquire that knowledge from the sketches of an Indian gentleman who knows the subject through and through, and has, moreover, so much of European culture that he is able to present the facts in a form that will not seem strange or incredible.—Birmingham Post.
A volume issued by Mr. T. Fisher Unwin, "Life in an Indian Village," is a sample of the kind of book relating to our Eastern Empire that we should like to see multiplied. It is the production of a scholarly native, T. Ramakrishna, B.A., who writes excellent idiomatic English without the slightest tendency to Johnsonian eloquence.—Christian Leader (Glasgow).
The manners and customs of the people are vividly reflected in these pages, and a picturesque account is given of a number of notabilities, such as the physician, &c.—Speaker (London).
The book cannot fail to fulfil the author's desire in exciting a deeper interest in the people whom he so sympathetically introduces to the British public.—Independent (London).
Written with much naïveté.—British Weekly (London).
The author of this book deserves our thanks and congratulations. Himself a highly educated native of the Madras Presidency, he has drawn a series of pictures of the village life of Southern India.... The occupations, the recreations, the religion, the distribution of labour, the recurrence of feast and festival, with much more, are all told in amusing style and with such graphic power as to leave a vivid impression upon the reader's mind.—Bookseller (London).
Madras should indulge some measure of pride in having turned out a University graduate who can write the English language better than most Englishmen. Ramakrishna's "Life in an Indian Village" is a charming account of Dravidian homes and customs. It is the work of a young man who has profited by Western enlightenment, and yet feels a kindly glow in his heart for all that belongs to the humblest folk in his native land. His sympathy is beautiful, because it is devoid of any pretence or forced pathos. His language is choice, yet simply constructed. There is real literary flavour about this work, which has just been published by Fisher Unwin. When will the Punjab give us a young man who can feel and think and write like this?—Civil and Military Gazette (Lahore).
Mr. T. Ramakrishna, a graduate of the Madras University, may be congratulated on the success which seems likely to attend the publication of his well-written little book on "Indian Village Life." Judging by the comments that have appeared in the English papers, it is just the kind of book the public at home wants, not too statistical to be readable, and not too ambitious in design to be trustworthy, but just a simple, picturesque account of the particular part of India which the author really knows.—London Correspondent of the Englishman (Calcutta).