In popular imagination, the Allied invasion of continental Europe is dominated by the Normandy Landings. The opening amphibious landing scene in Spielberg’s ‘Saving Private Ryan’ and the Cold War narrative of the joint Anglo-American thrust to free Europe and clear the road to Berlin have both contributed to this narrative. The truth was that months … Continue reading The Forgotten ‘Battle for Italy’ and Naples in 1944
Military life inflamed their ironic sensibilities and their skepticism. A single crude acronym that captured the soldier's lowered expectations-SNAFU, for "situation normal, all fucked up"-had expanded into a vocabulary of GI cynicism: SUSFU (situation unchanged, still fucked up); SAFU (self-adjusting fuck-up); TARFU (things are really fucked up); FUMTU (fucked up more than usual); JANFU (joint … Continue reading GI Slang
I spent 24 hours in Imphal. And in that brief window, gained a glimpse into the complex, fractured society of Manipur, thanks to the company of an erudite and deeply informed local resident. Manipur has always been a tinderbox due to its ethnic composition. The Meiteis, Kukis, Nagas and the Muslims form the main ethnic … Continue reading Imphal Notes
I spent the Eid weekend, revisiting the Islamic Revolution of Iran. Scott Anderson’s ‘King of Kings: The Fall of the Shah and the Revolution That Forged Modern Iran’ and Ryszard Kapuscinski’s ‘Shah of Shahs’ (which I’m revisting after 15 years) are good primers about the revolution. Over the last two years, seeing the protests of … Continue reading The 1979 Islamic Revolution
To him, Plath was ‘Laurentian’, not ‘women’s lib’ – that is, a disciple of D. H. Lawrence’s sexually liberated creative philosophy, not a campaigner for women’s rights. This line in Heather Clarke’s highly engrossing biography of Sylvia Plath, Red Comet: The Short Life and Blazing Art of Sylvia Plath, stumped me. I had no clue … Continue reading Laurentian Feminism
I’ve always been sceptical of the nostalgia and sentimentality associated with bygone eras and yesteryears. But despite this, each and every time I step into an Indian railway platform, a wave of memories washes over me. There were the childhood journeys from Bombay to Kozhikode in the pre-Konkan era, the Madras Mail to Salem, the … Continue reading A Paean to the Indian Railways
Ethnic violence, the Resource Curse and civil wars are often quoted to explain the development deficit in Africa. But a relatively little-known factor that can explain Africa’s position today is its historically low population density and its eventual role in facilitating the slave trade . Africa was historically a chronically underpopulated continent. In 1900, the … Continue reading How Population Scarcity Shaped Africa
In the 1960s, the discovery and development of Europe’s largest natural gas field in the Netherlands triggered an unexpected structural shift in the Dutch economy. The surge in export revenues brought in large inflows of foreign currency, leading to an appreciation of the Dutch guilder. A stronger currency made Dutch manufactured goods more expensive in … Continue reading The Dutch Disease
Will Eisner, is often credited to be the first person who introduced the term ‘Graphic Novel’. Today, the Eisner Awards, named after him, are the most coveted recognition for artists and publishers of comics and graphic novels. But a little known aspect of his career is the fact that before venturing into commercial comics, his … Continue reading A Rifle, a Photograph, and a Cartoonist
Romila Thapar’s ‘History of India’, published in 1966 begins with: For many Europeans, India evoked a picture of Maharajas, snake-charmers, and the rope-trick. This has lent both allure and romanticism to things Indian. The introduction of photography in India in the 1840s coincided with a critical phase of British colonial expansion and consolidation. What emerged … Continue reading Photography and the Colonial Gaze
