Essays

Non-fiction is Dead: Long Live Belles-lettres

Arpita Das

What’s so ‘non’ about literary work that is based on reportage and commentary? Let’s stop subordinating this genre with the term ‘non-fiction’

The Road to Freedom

Gopal Kaushik

What assures a man his freedom? Gopal Kaushik tried running away from home, even adopting a life of crime. But he remained miserable—until the day he bought his bike

Take Me Home

Saaz Aggarwal

The sadness, confusion and fear one felt as a young child never does go away, realised Saaz Aggarwal as she walked the corridors of the boarding school that was once her ‘home’

The Day of the Pawn

Sohini Chattopadhyay

Gobind Sharma runs a dhaba in Gurgaon. But when the clock strikes four, he becomes a master chess player

One Night in Bollywood

Marian Brehmer

What it means to be a foreign extra in an Indian movie

Writer Unblocked

Aastha Atray Banan

Writing a Mills & Boon novel rekindled a romance in Aastha Atray Banan’s life—the one with words. For, it finally allowed her to let go of the fear of being judged as a writer

A Lifetime in Ink

Isa EsAsi

A travelling tattoo artist, Isa EsAsi carries memories of the many friendships she made across the world on her own body

Ashok Kumar: The Evergreen Hero

Saadat Hasan Manto

On Ashok Kumar’s birth centenary, we bring you an excerpt from Saadat Hasan Manto’s brutally honest essay on his friend and colleague.

Death of the Reader

Tabish Khair

Readers who ignore historical silences in fiction by authors like Zadie Smith and Khalid Hosseini are just buying into the feel-good myth of multiculturalism