I was browsing through Michael Pollan’s ‘The Botany of Desire: A Plant's-Eye View of the World’ and the first chapter was on the Apple and its introduction to the New World. The apple originated in Central Asia, somewhere in present-day Kazakhstan. In fact, its capital Almaty owes it very name to the fruit – Alma-Ata … Continue reading On Apples
The struggling, misunderstood artist, aloof from the petty insecurities of the middle class and disdainful of wealth, is probably one of the most recognisable and done-to-death tropes in art, literature and popular culture. Such ‘artists’ even have a name – bohemians. David Weir in his 'A Very Short Introduction' to the topic defines them succinctly; … Continue reading Bohemians
Just Like Heaven: When was the last time I watched a Rom-Com? I should do more of this. Need more of such well-made syrupy stuff in life. Franklin: I began this anticipating it to be an entertaining capsule of Franklin's eventful mission to Paris. But the dark tones of the cinematography and the shallow script … Continue reading What I Watched – September 2026
Karan Mahajan’s The Complex was disappointing. It started with a bang. Gita, visiting her husband’s family home in Delhi, is raped by her husband’s uncle during a wedding. The narrative then shifts to her guilt, rage and the alienation that American cities are so good at generating. She dabbles in love outside her marriage, only … Continue reading Karan Mahajan’s ‘The Complex’
The Brits have always been dismissive of the French Revolution. Edmund Burke in his classic 'Reflections on the Revolution in France' correctly called out the eventual outcome of the whole revolution playing out across the Channel. He, like a prophet, predicted that the anarchy would eventually end in military rule and violence. In 1989, the … Continue reading Thatcher, Dickens and the French Revolution
I just finished Steinbeck’s ‘East of Eden’. The 850-page book is being adapted for the small screen, and the seven-episode series is dropping on Netflix in October. After reading this, I can confirm that Steinbeck’s best work is definitely ‘The Grapes of Wrath’ which I wrote about earlier. But nevertheless, the book kept me engaged. … Continue reading The Church and the Brothel: Steinbeck’s American West in ‘East of Eden’
Ron Chernow’s Pulitzer winning work - ‘Washington: A Life’ was a detailed biography of arguably the greatest American of all time. Unlike Ben Franklin, Jefferson or Hamilton, he was neither charismatic nor an erudite genius. But his greatness mainly stemmed from the fact that he nonchalantly gave up his role as the Commander-in-Chief of the … Continue reading George Washington
Over the past few days, I flipped through Tirthankar Roy and K. Ravi Raman’s ‘Kerala, 1956 to the Present: India’s Miracle State’. The book is part of Cambridge University Press’s Economic Histories of Indian States series. The next volume expected to be published in a month is on West Bengal. The central argument of the … Continue reading A Critique of the Kerala Model of Development
Through a cracking CWT episode, I discovered Julia Ioffe’s ‘Motherland: A Feminist History of Modern Russia, from Revolution to Autocracy’. The book traces the entire arc of Russian history from the Bolsheviks to Putin through a feminist lens and the lived experiences of Ioffe’s own family (who also happen to be Jewish and experienced the … Continue reading The Tragedy of the Russian Woman
In the 84 years that he lived, from 1706-90, the following is a non-exhaustive list of inventions/experiments/topics that Benjamin Franklin dabbled in: Positive and negative electrical charge terminology Hypothesis that lightning is electricity Kite experiment on atmospheric electricity Lightning rod Lightning-protection systems for buildings Idea of electrical grounding, Concept of capacitors and batteries Observation that … Continue reading Benjamin Franklin
