Sir James Brooke was an extraordinary "eminent" Victorian, whose life was the stuff of legend.
His curious career began in 1841 when he was caught up in a war in Brunei which had started because a party of local Dyaks had refused to furl their umbrellas in the presence of the Sultan. Brooke was an opportunist who, with the Sultan's backing, made war on the Dyak tribespeople and eventually found himself ruling over Sarawak - a substantial kingdom - as a result.
How Brooke found himself in this unique position is a romantic, sometimes horrifying story. Brooke is someone that George Macdonald Fraser would scarcely dare to invent. Errol Flynn wanted to play him in a movie, seventy years after his death and his dynasty is remembered throughout South-East Asia.
'White Rajah' is a wonderful piece of swashbuckling historical biography which recalls the best and the worst of the British Empirical character.
