• About

    I write a fortnightly "Letter from India" column for the International Herald Tribune, and occasionally for The New York Times

    I'm working on a non-fiction book about India, to be published by Riverhead in 2010

    I've written for The Atlantic, The Economist, Granta, The New York Times Book Review, The New Yorker, and several other publications

  • Highlights

    Two articles on the five-year anniversary of the tsunami (1, 2), from The International Herald Tribune and The New York Times. These follow-up from my two original reports on the tsunami, published in The New Yorker (1, 2).

    See also a related article from Granta on coastal erosion in South India.

    Two articles on the social impact of rapid development, from The International Herald Tribune and The New York Times (1, 2).

    I've also written on development for The Atlantic (an essay review on Amartya Sen ) and The Economist (on the digital divide).

    I've written several literary essays and reviews over the years. See this one on VS Naipaul, from Transition, and this one on Indian literature, from The New Statesman.

Positively Orwellian

Saturday, July 18th, 2009
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Kindle users beware: Amazon can make your books vanish from afar: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/07/18/amazon_removes_1984_from_kindle/

Why Do Intellectuals Oppose Capitalism?

Thursday, July 16th, 2009
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I’ve just stumbled across this article by Robert Nozick that tries to explain why “wordsmith” intellectuals are anti-market. I’m not sure I’m totally convinced, but his hypothesis–essentially, that they resent their low valuation in a capitalist economy–is nonetheless interesting reading. (I studied with Nozick as an undergraduate, in a course called something like “Socrates, Buddha, Jesus”!)

The Secret of His Success

Tuesday, November 11th, 2008
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Review of White Tiger, by Aravind Adiga, The New York Times Book Review

Learning to Love America, Again

Monday, November 3rd, 2008
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A posting about the presidential elections in America, from Granta.com
Over the last twenty months or so, as I have followed the presidential election from afar, something of my old admiration for America has been rekindled. Over and over, I have watched to my surprise as American voters have rejected the demagoguery they embraced in the two previous elections.

Letter From Pondicherry

Tuesday, April 1st, 2008
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An article on man-made beach erosion in South India, published in Granta.
Beaches are fragile ecosystems; what starts on one stretch continues along another. Over the years, the erosion has crept up the coast, eating away at the shoreline beyond Pondicherry, swallowing the homes and boats of fishermen. Villagers have been evacuated and livelihoods have been destroyed.

Up in Smoke

Sunday, July 2nd, 2006
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Review of English, August, by Upamanyu Chatterjee, The New York Times Book Review

‘Maps for Lost Lovers’: Little Murder

Sunday, May 22nd, 2005
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Review of Maps for Lost Lovers, by Nadeem Aslam, The New York Times Book Review

Behind the Digital Divide

Thursday, March 10th, 2005
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What do people on the ground really think of the digital divide? A ground-up view, published in The Economist.

The Third “R”

Monday, January 17th, 2005
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What happens after the waters recede? A second report on the tsunami, published in The New Yorker

Tsunami

Monday, January 10th, 2005
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A dispatch on the tsunami, published in The New Yorker
No one who survived the tsunami that crashed into South India on December 26th describes it as a wave. The fishermen and villagers who live along the coast, and whose homes and livelihoods were swept away, speak of a “wall of water.”