FROM THE BEST-SELLING AUTHOR OF MY SEDITIOUS HEART AND THE MINISTRY OF
UTMOST HAPPINESS, A NEW AND PRESSING DISPATCH FROM THE HEART OF THE CROWD
AND THE SOLITUDE OF A WRITER'S DESK The chant of 'Azadi!' - Urdu for
'Freedom!' - is the slogan of the freedom struggle in Kashmir against what
Kashmiris see as the Indian Occupation. Ironically, it also became the
chant of millions on the streets of India against the project of Hindu
Nationalism. Even as Arundhati Roy began to ask what lay between these two
calls for Freedom - a chasm or a bridge? - the streets fell silent. Not
only in India, but all over the world. The Coronavirus brought with it
another, more terrible understanding of Azadi, making a nonsense of
international borders, incarcerating whole populations, and bringing the
modern world to a halt like nothing else ever could. In this series of
electrifying essays, Arundhati Roy challenges us to reflect on the meaning
of freedom in a world of growing authoritarianism. The essays include
meditations on language, public as well as private, and on the role of
fiction and alternative imaginations in these disturbing times. The
pandemic, she says, is a portal between one world and another. For all the
illness and devastation it has left in its wake, it is an invitation to the
human race, an opportunity, to imagine another world.