An exiled colonial official’s letters to his daughter reveal emotional fragility beneath imperial bravado

Evidence

Valck regales Suze with his importance, his “new friendship” with a Balinese princess who owes him a favor and who he will ask to weave a gold-threaded silk cloth for her new dress. In the first year, he appeals to what he hopes will interest a small girl, describes his house, his menagerie of chickens and rabbits, and his dear dog, Marie. He tells her to let grandma know that he is in superb health. Six months later, his fairy tale format fades with his long illness and his outlook worn and worse … To have the wings of a bird so I could escape my kingdom and come to embrace you just for a moment and to see all the family. Perhaps you wouldn’t recognize me, since my illness I have become completely bald. But if you can wait a little until my hair grows back you won’t be too shocked to see me. The only thing is I’m becoming so fat I barely could catch up to you running. Do you remember when we played hide and seek in the woods? — Ann Laura Stoler, Along the Archival Grain_ Epistemic…, 1447

Categorization

• SEED: The letter from the balding, fattening father to his little girl, imagined as a fairy tale gone sour, is a ready-made emotional scene for any essay or fiction about the private cost of imperial careers.