The British Empire and the ‘Laureate of Its Demise’: Postimperial Nostalgia in Jane Gardam’s Old Filth Trilogy

Abstract

AbstractPublished over a period of ten years, between 2004 and 2014, Jane Gardam’s ‘Old Filth trilogy’ (Old Filth, The Man in the Wooden Hat, and Last Friends) can be seen to mark a period that retrospectively emerges as the lead-up to the 2016 Brexit referendum. Drawing on work by Paul Gilroy and Fintan O’Toole, this chapter suggests that Gardam’s trilogy participates in a narrative both popular and problematic which (re)imagines Britain’s ‘withdrawal’ from the colonies as a regrettable but noble act. In a curious reversal, this narrative casts Britain in the role of a victim of imperialism. Ultimately, the chapter is interested in how Gardam’s trilogy makes palatable an unapologetically nostalgic perspective on parts of Britain’s imperial past. Acknowledging the novels’ critical acclaim across a broad political spectrum, the chapter suggests that it is, above all, Gardam’s decision (inspired by Rudyard Kipling’s life and characters) to narrate recent British history from the point of view of so-called ‘Raj orphans’ which puts readers in a position to ward off feelings of guilt and shame and kindle a sense of national pride vis-à-vis a globalised world in which Britain seems to have, undeservedly, lost control.