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polarbear2023's review against another edition
I try so hard to like her I can't do it
jojo_'s review against another edition
adventurous
dark
funny
informative
reflective
slow-paced
4.25
badassbeo's review against another edition
i’m planning to come back and finish reading it. w non fiction i usually read it on & off, when the mood strikes for reading w a different type of focus/attention.
loxonstag's review against another edition
dark
funny
informative
reflective
slow-paced
4.0
This pretty exhaustive collection of Arundhati Roy's nonfiction from the mid 90s to the mid 10s, mostly dealing in Indian political and cultural discourse, can feel slightly overwhelming at times and more than a little repetitive, but it's more than worth it to see how she sharpens her rhetoric and prose over time. The later essays like Walking with the Comrades are particularly vivid and persuasive, great nonfiction that could only be written by a great novelist.
lifeinpoetry's review against another edition
4.0
I became uncomfortable with her talk of the evils of Hinduism but considering she grew up as a religious minority and that 79.8% of the population in India is Hindu is it any worse than religious minorities or nonbelievers lambasting Christianity in the US?
sujata's review against another edition
4.0
I liked that the essays were mostly placed in chronological order, or in some order of topic, it was a good flow. There is some repetition of ideas and frameworks when reading them all together but that's only to be expected. Worth a read especially for some past context of current situation and horribleness in India....and the US.
edulaia's review against another edition
challenging
informative
reflective
medium-paced
4.25
Magazines, neither online nor printed, are not the medium for me. I am a cover-to-cover reader and the very different articles in each issue make me confused and I loose track. This compilation of Arundathi Roy's journalism onto ca 1000 pages clearly shows that it is not the content of journalistic articles that I have trouble with.
Roy is witty, precise, empathetic, unapologetic and fearless. The content of her articles would make me loose faith in humanity, curl up in a corner and just give up on the planet it it were not for her abilitiy to somehow find hope and turn that hope into anger and resistance. I don't live in India. But I have learned a lot about the really extremeply complex recent history of that place from Roy. It also made me question some assumptions about human beings. Most of all it confronted me with the human capacity for extreme violence that certainly needs to be taken into account when imagining a peaceful and just world.
Roy is witty, precise, empathetic, unapologetic and fearless. The content of her articles would make me loose faith in humanity, curl up in a corner and just give up on the planet it it were not for her abilitiy to somehow find hope and turn that hope into anger and resistance. I don't live in India. But I have learned a lot about the really extremeply complex recent history of that place from Roy. It also made me question some assumptions about human beings. Most of all it confronted me with the human capacity for extreme violence that certainly needs to be taken into account when imagining a peaceful and just world.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Violence
shelfiegen's review against another edition
4.0
4.5. she is so smart. I don't know all of the intricacies of Indian politics and history so some of that was lost on me but was still easy enough to follow. the essays on imperialism / globalism / USA / lefty-politics were great.