India: A Mosaic

by Robert B. Silvers (Editor), Arundhati Roy (Introduction)

How can we understand India today, fifty years after Independence and only months after its nuclear tests outraged the world? The novelist Arundhati Roy has written, specially for this collection, a fierce denunciation of the Indian nuclear program, which serves as an introduction to nine essays on India, all originally published in The New York Review of Books . In this volume, seven distinguished writers offer penetrating insights into the complexities of the subcontinent. Roderick MacFarquhar reflects on the legacy of Empire and Partition, Ian Buruma considers secularism and Indian democracy, Pankaj Mishra remembers life in Benares, and Christopher de Bellaigue writes on a violent Bombay. But the volatile intersections of history, politics, and culture on which they focus haunt Indian literature too, as shown in essays by Nobel Prize-winner Amartya Sen on Rabindranath Tagore, Hilary Mantel on Rohinton Mistry, and Anita Desai on Indian women's writing.
Included is a specially commissioned CD containing a wide range of Indian music.

Genres: India, Nonfiction

288 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2000

About the author

Robert Silvers was an American editor who served as editor of The New York Review of Books from 1963 to 2017.

Reviews

[Kyle Kane]

I didn’t hate it, but as my first foray into India history, it wasn’t great.

While some of the chapters are definitely exciting and interesting perspectives, without a great knowledge of contemporary India politics, I felt a little lost.

Also, could do without the book and movie reviews. Felt out of place and really got nothing out of those chapters.