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Explore Essays and memoir

On the Refugee Crisis

Gazmend Kapllani

‘Europe, my love. You have such a long history; and oftentimes such a short memory.’

Driving in Greater Noida

Deepti Kapoor

‘Greater Noida is a paranoid, fractured land.’

The Ghost in the Kimono

Raghu Karnad

Deep in the dense volume of Delhi’s history Raghu Kardad investigates ‘the remarkable, untold story of the Japanese in the Old Fort’.

Patna Roughcuts

Amitava Kumar

Amitava Kumar returns to his hometown of Patna

Pyre

Amitava Kumar

‘In more ways than one, the rituals of death had reminded me that I was an outsider.’

Best Book of 2015: After The Dance

Dimitry Elias Léger

Dimitry Elias Léger on why Jan Gaye's After the Dance is the best book of 2015.

Best Book of 2017: Shadowbahn

Jonathan Lethem

Jonathan Lethem on why Steve Erickson's Shadowbahn is the best book of a year to come.

The Invitation

Barry Lopez

‘The effort to know a place deeply is, ultimately, an expression of the human desire to belong, to fit somewhere.’

Travel Notes About Death

Susana Moreira Marques

‘The first notes I take are about a man who was born, grew up, worked, was married, had a daughter, grew old, and died in the same village.’

The Exorcism of Doctor Escudero

Gabi Martínez

‘His body was like a rock. It wasn’t his. It was like he was possessed.’

Empathy and the New Refugee Crisis

Charlotte McDonald-Gibson

‘What does it take to remind people that you are human?’

Pinter for Dogs

Livi Michael

‘If everyone let someone in there wouldn’t be a problem.’

Gandhi the Londoner

Sam Miller

‘On 29 September 1888, an Indian teenager with a mild case of ringworm and a fine head of hair sailed into the Thames Estuary.’ Sam Miller on Ghandi's time in London.

On the Refugee Crisis

Sarah Moss

‘I imagine that each of my migrant forebears needed a bit of help on each arrival, a bit of human decency’