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savaging's review
4.0
If I'm going to be reading non-fiction, then please let it be Arundhati Roy essays. She is brutal, brilliant, and also funny amid all the horror. And so good at sentences.
It was also good for me to be reminded to think more about India, consider global policy from that perspective.
It was also good for me to be reminded to think more about India, consider global policy from that perspective.
kyrajade's review
4.0
I really enjoyed this take on essay/criticism because it did not have the same jargon-y language often employed which makes criticism, specifically about capitalism, difficult to read. The tone of this work is, in some ways, chatty but also well referenced and straight to the point. The only draw back is the tendency for hyperbole (sometimes without a source) which can undermine the severity of the issue at hand (although, paradoxically, one could argue that it serves to highlight the issue and outline its importance above other points). I think it's very important to read criticisms of capitalism outside of the Western canon (which dominates much of the conversation about the topic), as it reveals the scale of global capitalism that we are currently dealing with and the inescapability of this particular economic system. The first essay in the book is definitely the star piece whilst the others are a direct response to a specific event which I didn't find quite as profound, perhaps because they generally developed points already touched upon. I also think that this work did something which others concerned with capitalism do not, and that is the environmental and ecological implications of the pursuit of business interests. This is great to read alongside Adinga's 'The White Tiger' and Mehta's 'Maximum City' as both a fictional and journalistic account (respectively) of the same phenomena being spoken about in Roy's work.
jershkat's review
dark
informative
reflective
fast-paced
5.0
Arundhati Roy is, as always, highly-researched, sharp-tongued, and aiming for justice. Roy is a constant critic of India’s far-right, neoliberal, corrupt, religio-nationalist state. She is an important voice, and this book is cutting and eye-opening. A must read.