Why a Booktrail?
1825: Mauritus – the landscape of rootlessness .
The Prisoner of Paradise
What you need to know before your trail
When Lucy Gladwell’s father dies, she sent off to live with her aunt and uncle live in grand plantation house on the island of Mauritius. She has nothing of note with her but is told she has money due to her which never comes.When loving with the house, she is encouraged to immerse herself in the local community. It’s not long before she meet an enigmatic man but the relationship is not an easy one.This is an island of tension and of a war brewing. These are the years of slavery and there is the chance that a new leader will change the face of the island and the fate of its inhabitants for ever.
Travel Guide
Mauritius is an interesting place, a unique place and in 1825 a very fascinating one. This is the island as the age of slavery is coming to an end.
The island of Mauritius
1825 in Mauritius and the age of slavery is coming to an end but the British are still shipping convicts from India and Ceylon to fill positions of plantation workers on the island. It’s decades since the British won it from the French during the Napoleonic Wars but the island is still divided and a tough place to be. The island is a tinderbox just waiting to explode and the consequences wil be far reaching. The rebellion and a storm both follow.
The beauty of the island
Initial descriptions immerse you into the sights and sounds of the island. The bustling markets and the teeming streets. But the overall paradise for Lucy is life on a plantation where life is very different to that which she has been used to. Life is restrictive and difficult for women especially.
From Paradise….
The bay was bright and blue. On the edge, the small island port lay basking in the sun”
Oh and Mauritius is really evocatively drawn – from the lush fragrant flowers in the gardens around the plantation house to the dazzling light and the heady fragrance of the fruit on the trees. Oh and the guava juice! Don and Lucy have a different way of looking at the island however. The plantation home of Ambleside however is both beauty and restriction for her – descriptions of this are honey flavoured, a spacious she has never seen before and servants to attend on her. Even the flowers in the pots are not like the weak wilting flowers of England. Here they are described as “vegetative spears”.
..to slavery
The story of the island itself is interlaced with the overriding sense of what it must have been like to have experienced slavery on which ever side you were on. Freedom as a woman, freedom as a human being, and freedom in 1825 are very difficult things to work out. An extracted prince from Sri Lanka in on the island and it’s this mix of backgrounds and cultures that provide the most explosive mix.
Where Next?
