{"product_id":"2026200015707-secondhand-raffles","title":"Raffles","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eCondition remarks:\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBook: Good\u003cbr\u003eJacket: No dust jacket\u003cbr\u003ePages: Good\u003cbr\u003eCondition remarks: Condition as shown in image\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eFew figures in the history of the British Empire cast as long a shadow as Sir Thomas Stamford Raffles — soldier, statesman, naturalist, and the founder of modern Singapore. Maurice Collis's Raffles presents a vivid and authoritative portrait of this remarkable man, chronicling his meteoric rise through the ranks of the East India Company, his turbulent governorship of Java, his clashes with colonial superiors, and his audacious establishment of a trading post on a swampy island at the tip of the Malay Peninsula that would become one of the world's great cities.\n\nCollis, celebrated for his elegant biographical prose and his intimate knowledge of Southeast Asian history, renders Raffles not merely as an agent of empire but as a man of genuine intellectual curiosity — a passionate collector of flora, fauna, and indigenous art who saw commerce and civilisation as inseparable. Written with novelistic momentum yet grounded in meticulous historical research, Raffles raises enduring questions about ambition, colonialism, and the complicated legacies left by those who reshape the world in their own image. Was Raffles a visionary humanitarian or the ultimate architect of imperial expansion? Collis leaves the reader to wrestle with that question long after the final page.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Secondhand Stock","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":49203255640283,"sku":"2026200015707-SECONDHAND","price":10.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0523\/7646\/9701\/files\/81463074-f851-4188-bed9-cb2a9798f5e5.png?v=1788146554","url":"https:\/\/bookgrocer.com\/products\/2026200015707-secondhand-raffles","provider":"Book Grocer","version":"1.0","type":"link"}