‘Epic and surely definitive.’ – The Times

‘One of the two best books on an Indian musician.’ – Ramachandra Guha

As an icon of India, Ravi Shankar ranks not far below Gandhi or the Taj Mahal. He was one of the twentieth century’s most important musicians, the breadth of his impact reflected in those he influenced: George Harrison, John Coltrane, Philip Glass and Yehudi Menuhin, to name a few.

In this first biography of Ravi Shankar, Oliver Craske presents a full portrait of the man and the artist, painting a vivid picture of the public and private faces of a captivating, restless workaholic who lived an intense and extraordinary life across 92 years.

Selected as a Book of the Year in The Times, The Spectator, Times Literary Supplement, Library Journal and BBC Music.

Published in hardback, ebook and audiobook in April 2020, and in paperback in June 2021.

• Read an extract from the Introduction.

• A Spotify playlist is available.

To order

Here are links to some major booksellers in the UK, USA and India, or try your local independent. It’s available in other countries too.

UK paperback:  Faber  Amazon UK  Waterstones  Foyles  Blackwell’s  WH Smith  Bookshop  LRB
UK hardback:  Faber  Amazon UK  Waterstones  Foyles  Blackwell’s  WH Smith  Bookshop  LRB 
UK eBook:  Kindle  Google  Kobo 
US hardcover: Hachette  Amazon  B&N  Bookshop
US eBook: Hachette  Kindle  B&N
India paperback: Amazon  Flipkart
India hardback: Amazon  Flipkart
India eBook:  Kindle
Audiobook: Audible UK  Amazon UK  Audible.com  Amazon.com  B&N  Kobo  Hachette USA  Amazon India 

Reviews

‘It is difficult to imagine how a life of this master musician could be bettered.’ – Andrew Lycett, Literary Review

‘A wonderful book.’ – Nitin Sawhney

‘Compendious and immensely readable.’ – Amit Chaudhuri, Prospect

‘Superb… Deeply researched and elegantly written. It introduces the subtleties and complexities of Indian classical music extremely well for the lay reader… Offers a rich and well-rounded portrait of the man whose music has kept me company all my life.’ – Ramachandra Guha, Times Literary Supplement

‘‘He wears his expertise lightly and his passion on his sleeve: a winning combination for a definitive work.’ – Neil Spencer, The Observer

‘A superbly written biography… this book makes me fall in love with Ravi Shankar all over again.’ – Peter Lavezzoli, author of The Dawn of Indian Music in the West: Bhairavi

‘A master receives masterly treatment… an outstanding, forensic and deeply sympathetic biography.’ – Mark Kidel, Arts Desk

‘Gives us a superb trove of detail, some of it astonishing.’ – Tunku Varadarajan, Wall Street Journal

‘Tells the personal and musical story of a life that changed so many musical cultures.’ – Tom Service, Music Matters (BBC Radio 3)

‘A definitive, meticulously truthful book, full of discoveries.’ – Antonia Quirke, Pick of the Week (BBC Radio 4)

‘Magisterial… a masterclass in biographer empathy without resorting to hagiographic adoration of his subject.’ – Somak Ghoshal, Mint

‘Indian Sun is that rare thing, a biography of a famous musician in which the music is kept in the foreground and knowledgeably discussed.’ – Andrew Ford, Inside Story (Australia)

‘This is a meticulously researched biography, detailed, judicious, engaging and illuminating. Not since Marie Seton’s Portrait of a Director: Satyajit Ray in 1971 has anything comparable been attempted for a major contemporary Indian cultural figure.’ – Partho Datta, India Today

A must-read book for any lover of Indian music.’ – The Tribune (India)

‘It does not really matter if you are not mad about Hindustani classical music or a fan of the sitar, Indian Sun: The Life and Music of Ravi Shankar is still a riveting read. It is much more than the racy life story of an epoch-making musician and an unapologetic sensualist. It is also a chronicle of the evolution of Indian and world music since the critical early decades of the 20th century, and of the political and cultural shifts that foregrounded it.’ – Malini Nair, The Hindu/Business Line

‘The first biography to be written about Shankar, pieced together by dozens of interviews with the man himself, as well as hundreds with his family and friends. Craske brings an intimate, expert reading of Shankar’s music, as well as revelatory access to create the definitive portrait of his context within modern culture.’ – The Guardian

‘A supremely readable biography that deftly interweaves his personal life, his professional life, and where necessary some brilliant analysis of his music and Indian music in general.’ – Simon Broughton, Songlines

‘Read as a whole, this book feels like an Indian version of A Dance to the Music of Time: the same characters bumping into each other over the course of nearly a century, relationships fraying and re-knitting, love affairs flaring, dying down, re-igniting, children repeating the mistakes of their parents, all against a backdrop of war and famine and independence and nationalism.’ – David Honigmann, The Spectator

‘Of all the astonishing things that happened in the 1960s, the transformation of Ravi Shankar into global superstar and hippy hero is one of the hardest to explain to anyone who wasn’t there. Yet Oliver Craske’s superlative biography… achieves that and much more. Shankar’s protean 80-year career… is narrated in revelatory detail… Still writing an opera on his deathbed at 92, the perpetually impish Shankar lived in a kind of wonderland conjured up by his musical genius. Craske evokes that world superbly; a masterly chronicle of a life teeming with all-too-human incident but heavenly inspiration.’ – Richard Morrison, The Times 

‘Oliver Craske’s extraordinary biography Indian Sun… is not a hagiographic portrait of a spiritual icon but a remarkably human life story, defined by familial failures, seething rivalries, physical frailty and relentless ambition… Indian Sun transcends its subject by becoming something larger than a narrow timeline of an undeniably large life. In using Shankar as an axis, Craske has written a broader cultural history of music and hyphenated artists in the 20th century – a measured rumination on the possibilities and the price of artistic ambition… this is a beautiful book, as resplendent as its subject’s music and life.’ – Bilal Qureshi, Washington Post

‘This first authorised biography is the product of 25 years’ research and interviews. For fans of Shankar and Indian classical, Oliver Craske’s mighty work will surely be a delight.’ – Ammar Kalia, The Guardian

‘A key virtue of this fine biography is that it mostly resists the tendency to idealise Shankar. When [Richard] Attenborough went to see India’s prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, in the early 1960s about his proposed film on Gandhi, Nehru advised him that it would be wrong to deify the Mahatma because “he was too great a man for that”. Craske fruitfully follows the spirit of Nehru’s advice.’ – Andrew Robinson, Sight & Sound

‘Indian Sun is a new authoritative biography of the Indian musician Ravi Shankar’s life, published to coincide with this year’s centenary of his birth… Oliver Craske traces the full breadth of Shankar’s life beyond the known flashpoints of his career.’ – All Things Considered (National Public Radio)

‘Book of the Week’ – The Week (UK)

‘Compelling, informative, and the definitive book on this musical legend.’ – Library Journal

‘After 658 pages, you know more about Ravi Shankar as a person than you ever thought possible. It is a knowledge that somehow opens a new door to his music and to India.’ – Johan Scherwin, Lira (Sweden)

‘Richly informative; no musician’s life was more densely studded with incident, yet Craske manages to marshal the multitudinous facts into an agreeably readable narrative.… At one level it’s cultural history, with illuminating chapters on All India Radio and on the emergence of the soundtracks to the Apu trilogy and Jonathan Miller’s Alice… But it’s also a penetrating and judicious portrait of a supremely gifted artist who was at the same time an anxious (at one point suicidal) workaholic, with an admitted sex addiction and a propensity to procreate without shouldering the attendant responsibilities. Norah, Anoushka, Sukanya and the numerous other female characters in this family saga lovingly forgive him; John Coltrane, Yehudi Menuhin, George Harrison and Philip Glass pay tribute as devoted disciples.’ – Michael Church, BBC Music

‘Written with insight and compassion, the book presents the maestro as he was, warts and all.’ – Shailaja Khanna, The Hindu

‘This biography is an authorised account but it is an unfettered recounting. Posterity should be thankful to Sukanya and Anoushka Shankar for having made this possible. Craske deserves praise for having done a remarkable job indeed.’ – S. Kalidas, The Wire (India)

‘This fine book has been a beacon of light for me in the dark days of the global pandemic. Oliver Craske's lightly-worn erudition and Faber’s typically high production standards are a sharp reminder of how publishing standards have plummeted… It is also a timely reminder that Beethoven is not the only anniversary game in town.’ – On An Overgrown Path

‘A life that is as fantastic as it is Bohemian, glowing and illustrious.’ – Jane Borges, Mid-day

‘The definitive work on a musical genius whose contribution to the world went beyond music.’ – Charlie Connelly, The New European

‘Superlative… a sympathetic and highly detailed portrait of a flawed but deeply charismatic man… A remarkable book about a truly remarkable musician.’ – Charles Waring, Record Collector

‘Having read Indian Sun, you feel compelled to believe Craske when he says Shankar lived “one of the great lives of the century”.’ – Shreevatsa Nevatia, Open: The Magazine (India)

‘Oliver Craske tells this remarkable story with clarity, admiration and a fine understanding of all the musical systems in which Ravi Shankar was engaged. He has been fortunate as a biographer in the unequalled access he had to Ravi Shankar in the last twenty years of his life and to his family and friends then and since. He has also had access to the entirety of the archive, including letters, photographs, concert notes, music notebooks, travel schedules and royalty statements. Craske has used this vast resource skilfully. He is aware of the classic biographer’s problem of getting too close to his subject… It will be hard for Indian Sun to be matched, for the good reason that Oliver Craske ensures that the music is always foregrounded… It is always the music, and how rich that is, that dominates this marvellous book.’ – Keshav Desiraju, Scroll (India)

‘A fascinating read.’ – Alice Temperley, Mayfair Times.

‘Firmly grounded in Shankar’s music and culture, it is both accessible and revealing.’ Andrew Lycett, Spectator Books of the Year

‘The great sitarist and composer Ravi Shankar… has found a mighty biographer in Oliver Craske.’ – Jonathan Benthall, Times Literary Supplement Books of the Year

‘The man who brought sitar music to the world was revered in the West as the ultimate symbol of Indian classical excellence, but it was a different matter back home. “Part sadhu, part playboy,” India Today wrote on the master’s 60th birthday, and that is the contradiction Oliver Craske explores in his exhaustive biography.’ – Will Hodgkinson, The Times Books of the Year

‘This compelling and informative biography is the definitive look at legendary sitarist, composer, and teacher Ravi Shankar. Craske places his subject’s career in an appropriately global context, paying close attention to Shankar’s personal and cultural relationship with India while detailing his vast impact on Western music. A fitting tribute to an influential musician.’ – Library Journal Best Arts Books of 2020

‘Ravi Shankar is fortunate to have had such a biographer as Oliver Craske, a candid but judicious friend and no hero-worshipper – Indian Sun is likely to be the definitive biography of Ravi Shankar for many years to come.’ – John Butler, Asian Review of Books

‘Leaves the reader in no doubt as to Shankar’s significance, or his extraordinary life.’ – Alastair Mabbott, The Herald (Scotland)

‘Craske plays the part of admirer and reporter with balance and skill… All-encompassing and engrossing, the blend of academic detail with shrewdly documented intimacies makes for an enlightening read.’ – Tony Clayton-Lea, Irish Times (paywall)