Living in harmony with nature

The book opens with a story of an 18th century massacre in which as many as 363 Bishnois were beheaded by men who worked for the king, Abhay Singh, as they tried to protect trees that those men wanted to cut down for the king. More Bishnois were in the queue for sacrifice, but the news reached the palace, and the killing stopped. Such a story has never been told, and it is unlikely to be ever repeated. It remains the bravest act of nature conservation ever seen. The martyrs of village Khejarli in western Rajasthan were all Bishnois, led by a woman named Amrita Devi, who stood for the community commitment to live in harmony with nature. 

Who were the Bishnois? What had got them together to stage such a mass sacrifice? The Bishnois who laid down their lives were only following their guru Jambhoji who, during the 15th century unprecedented drought, had called them to live in harmony with nature. “A tree covered in greenery is my temple and my home.” In telling the extraordinary story of this desert-dwelling community, Martin Goodman, a professor of creative writing at the University of Hull, presents the Bishnois as the most ecologically conscience community in the world.   

The Bishnois have persisted with such a conscience ever since, following a life lived in harmony with nature. It is perhaps the only religion or the religious practice in the world that has environmental protection in its core. Their founding guru declared his place of divine residence to be ‘A tree covered in greenery is my temple and my home.’ The spiritual leader declared twenty one rules which are religiously followed till date, most famously followed by the woman who had led 363 villagers to lay down their lives while chanting ‘my head for a tree’.

Times have changed but not the values that remain dear to them. They do protect living beings at any cost, however, in modern times they have evolved into eco-warriors to ensure that the laws of the land are forcefully endorsed to protect all lives. To a Bishnoi, killing a monitor lizard is as hideous a crime as killing a tiger. Salman Khan learnt it the hard way. Charged for hunting a protected species of the blackbuck, the actor was booked for violation under a criminal offence. 

Goodman provides details of the case, highlighting how the Bishnois patience and perseverance was tested against Khan’s popular image and power. It took no less 68 appearances in the court 

over a period of twenty years to pronounce the verdict. In the years between the blackbuck killings and the actor’s guilty verdict, the Bishnois’ Tiger Force had teamed with law enforcers in perusing the case. The force has maintained information networks to bust illegal activities, so that a repeat of the 1998 blackbuck incident does not recur.   

My Head For A Tree is a story about the incredible relentlessness of the Bishnois. Their commitment to a cause isn’t time sensitive, it becomes their life. They see the natural world as a vital entity with rights of plants and animals equal to us, the humans. A Bishnoi woman breast-feeding an orphaned gazelle, chinkara, could be a common sight. And it is not done to create an identity for themselves, but to present what they firmly believe in. Their love for chinkara is profound, with 85 percent of its global population endemic to south-west Rajasthan.  

The Bishnois is an inspiring story that offers not only wisdom, but a concern to forge non-violent action. It is a book about people saving the planet, the message is embedded in what they do to safeguard nature. Goodman has been to their farms, their schools, their temples, and even animal shelters in narrating the ecological commitment and empathy. Pictures by Franck Vogel in the volume are relevant to the context. For people facing unprecedented challenge of rising temperature and desertification, the book has a subtle message for survival. 

My Head For A Tree is an engaging book that connects our glorious past with an uncertain future, in relating an extraordinary group of people and their practices to the impending climatic challenges. It is a book that fills a gap in the ongoing environmental debate. Within the incredible ongoing story about an amazing community lies the future story of human survival. The story of first eco-warriors, which now number no more than a million people, hold a strong message for the teeming millions.  

It is an essential reading for those who are concerned about our collective future. The Bishnoism holds a future that is dear to all of us. The Bishnois are born, and their practices can be followed to confront our present crises. 

My Head For A Tree
by Martin Goodman
Profile Books/ Hachette, New Delhi 
Extent: 270, Price: Rs. 699.

First published in New Indian Express on 9 Feb 2025

People are a mystery

Nita Prose has picked up from where she had left her debut murder mystery The Maid. The hotel remains the venue for Molly Gray, the maid, to clean up a murderous mess yet again. Known for keeping the guest rooms in a state of cleaning perfection, the hotel’s reputation has been sullied again by the death of a famous mystery writer moments before he gets up to address the press. That the teacup was laced with some poison seemed apparent but the motive and the person executing the sinister crime offers a pitch-perfect plot that is intriguing and enthralling. It is a slow but tasteful whodunnits rendering of any vintage. 

Devil is in the details, more so in a murder mystery that remains loaded with both innocuous and obnoxious but in which none is above suspicion. Having been relieved of any suspicion in the past, Molly remains concerned that despite being diligent in their work, the maids are assumed to be delinquents, murderers and thieves. Why is the lowly maid always to be blamed? The words carry layers of meaning that leave the reader seething and feeling sad about the society we have morphed into. Prose’s writing functions as mirrors for our internal landscapes.

The Mystery Guest makes for slow reading of an immaculately crafted narrative, which makes it hard to discover clues lying amidst what gets thought as kept asides. Not without reason was Molly surprised when the world-renowned celebrity author had missed noticing her dominating presence in the team making arrangements for the event. It unfolds later in the story that Molly knew the dead guest during her younger days and remembers some of the secrets which may hold the key to the mystery. But unlocking it means thinking about the past.   

It is not only the gentle observational quality of author's prose but her aphoristic brilliance that shines through the story. The control over language and choice of words helps create a visual imagery to unlock the mystery. A segment of Molly’s past flashes before her eyes to remind her of the idiosyncrasies of the celebrated author as she accompanied her granny for domestic work at his sprawling mansion. Much later it occurred to her that the celebrated author used talents of others to palm them off his own. The difference between a fraud and a predator is hairline.     

It goes without saying that making a choice between what is morally right and what is economically beneficial is tricky. At times, the choice gets set in the wrong place, focusing on one’s weaknesses instead of strengths. For making a lucrative choice, the celebrated author had to pay a price with his life. Prose reminds her reader that at the end of it all, people are a mystery that can never be solved. That is what makes The Mystery Guest truly enthralling. 

Molly’s take on life is enjoyable and reflective. The mystery is not about events that disturb people but the judgements concerning them. Nita Prose has evolved a style of her own in making the genre exquisite and enchanting. Every sentence is a treat to read, even when it is plumbing the bleakest truths of society and humanity. It is rollicking and emotional, tender and sharp, absurd and relatable. The writing is packed with sharp observations on the most eccentric human behavior, all propelled by a story that is slow-paced but addictive. Let it be clear that the mystery is not solved, till it gets solved. There are many a slip between the celebrated author’s lips and the poison-laced teacup.

The Mystery Guest
by Nita Prose
HarperCollins, London
Extent: 327, Price: Rs. 499.

First published in Deccan Herald on Feb 16, 2025.

Bishnois have message for everyone

Martin Goodman, a professor of creative writing, tells the extraordinary story of a desert-dwelling community of western Rajasthan who live in complete harmony with nature. The story dates back to 11 September 1730, in which 363 villagers led by Amrita Devi were beheaded by men who worked for the king and had wanted those trees to be logged. The massacre only stopped when the news reached the king, Abhay Singh. The martyrs of village Khejarli were all Bishnois, who were only following their guru Jambhoji who, during the 15th century unprecedented drought, had called them to live in harmony with nature.  

The Bishnois have persisted with such a conscience ever since, following it as a religion (perhaps the only one) that has environmental protection at its core. Their founding guru, Jambhoji (1451-1536), received a world-changing vision while in meditation under a tree. ‘A tree covered in greenery is my temple and my home.’ The spiritual leader set out the twenty-one rules in the sixteenth century which are religiously followed till date, most famously by a woman who had led 363 villagers to give their lives while chanting ‘my head for a tree’.

Times have changed but not the values that have remained dear to them. World over, men die for woman or for money. The same doesn’t hold good for Bishnois, who instead lay down their life to protect animals and trees. They do protect living beings at the cost of their lives, however, in modern times they have evolved into eco-warriors to ensure that the laws of the land are forcefully endorsed to protect all lives. The Bishnoi Tiger Force protects trees from loggers and animals from poachers. Even screen celebrity Salman Khan couldn’t escape their die-hard protective commitment. 

I have to say that Goodman’s timing with this release is timely, the story is steeped in ecologicsl issues and history. Despite its rich legacy, the story of the Bishnois has remained perhaps ‘a greatest story yet to be told’. Not anymore, the story about a community committed to protect the environment is out for the wider public. Its historical legacy notwithstanding, facts and values may have remained exclusive for Bishnois but their dedication to protect the trees and the animals can no longer remain confined.   

My Head For A Tree is a story about the incredible relentlessness of the Bishnois. Their commitment to a cause isn’t time sensitive, taken as a break from their regular lives; it becomes their life. They see the natural world as a vital entity with rights at least equal to ours. And that natural world includes other people as well as plants and animals. No wonder, a Bishnoi woman can be seen breast feeding an orphaned chinkara, a gazelle. And they don’t do it to create an identity for themselves, but to present what they believe in and practice.  

The Bishnois’ love of chinkara is profound. Around 85 percent of its global population live in the south-west Rajasthan. They flock to any waterhole but can also find enough moisture from plants and dew to survive days without drinking. Chinkara is now rightfully protected, not only in India but other countries like Pakistan and Iran. Khejri, the state tree of Rajasthan, is protected by law. The 363 martyrs at Khejrali weren’t forgotten while enacting such a law. What is more, if one tree is illegally felled then ten must be planted. 

It is an inspiring story that offers wisdom, concern and commitment. Spread across eighteen chapters, Goodman has been to Bishnoi’s farms, their schools, their temples, and animal shelters in giving the book a humbling touch of ecological commitment and empathy. Generous spread of pictures in the volume are not only relevant but enrich the narrative. If people across several countries face the unprecedented challenge of rising temperature and desertification, the Bishnois hold with them the message of survival not for themselves but for the community.

My Head For A Tree is an engaging book that connects our glorious past with an uncertain future, in relating an extraordinary group of people to the future climate collapse. Within the incredible ongoing story about a community lies the future story of survival of the mankind. The story of first eco-warriors, which now number no more than 6 lakh people, hold a message for all of us.  It is an essential reading for those who are concerned about our collective future, the Bishnoism that holds a future that is dear to all of us.                                      

My Head For A Tree
by Martin Goodman
Profile Books/ Hachette, New Delhi 
Extent: 270, Price: Rs. 699.

First published in The Hindustan Times on Feb 6, 2025.

Three things' women can only do

It was in 1758 when Linnaeus came up with two simultaneous new terms –mammalia and Homo sapiens – which effectively linked women to animals and men to a higher intelligence. Linnaeus thought women lacked rational thought and opposed educating his daughter because he wanted women to be ‘hearty, strong housekeepers, and fashionable dolls.’ Not only him specifically but menfolk in general were convinced. It never occurred to them that women can do ‘three’ big things that men can never imagine they could – ‘create life, give birth, and breastfeed’. Women have to do proclaim that power rather than be ashamed of it

Many biopsies and after a double mastectomy, sociologist Sarah Thornton decided to write Tits Up, the book about the history, cultural significance, and social valuing of breasts. Written with candor and humor, the book is grounded in research to provide the reader with a nuanced understanding of its intersectionality. Thornton tells the stories of sex workers, milk bankers, and cosmetic surgeons, without missing on society’s obsession with boobs. Negative views on breasts are so common that any attempt at improving women’s esteem is taken lightly. Unless the breasts could be seen anything but erotic playthings, these will remain in dominant patriarchal system.  

With more than 700 expressions of mammary glands in English language, it loses nomenclature when it is not in divine bodies in time and space. Yes, the spiritual significance as an alternative to the breasts represented in the media is altogether different. In scriptures and religious practices, the elemental feminine energy is the prime source and sustainer of the universe. However, unlike other religions, the continuous goddess tradition in Hinduism do not extend any material benefits for Indian women. Are the goddess mere protagonists who have miraculous capacity to save life?

Central argument of the book is that women’s breasts is unnecessarily sexualized and trivialized. Whatever be its size and shape, breasts give women distinct identity and dignity. The sexual difference thus constructed is universally accepted, and along with it comes the fear of anatomy that makes women perpetually susceptible. Curiously, it is this distinction between ‘physical sex’ and ‘social gender’ that is only widening.   

Tits Up does not allow easy dismissal of breasts as shallow or superfluous organ. Thornton aims to protect women by exploring business opportunity and empowering possibilities around breasts. Women’s chest surely means business, but critical is to ascertain how much of this business is in woman’s own control. Come to think of it, breast is as much a site of empowerment as divinity. The core idea is that if planned and positioned properly, breasts can help women create a new vision for themselves. It seems a tall undertaking!

Without breasts, humans could not be humans. Homo sapiens is distinguished by the superlative communication skills that develop as a result of the lengthy dependence of human babies on their mother’s milk. Infants need to solicit love and, in turn, develop interactive ability to adore. Every child experiences it but that this experience doesn’t last long. As a result, women are left to decide on what she decides on her body. ‘I hope it will be get considered that a woman will exercise her right to choose what she does to her own body’. 

Sarah Thronton wants to hold the power of the women to elevate the status of their breasts, because that in itself makes her weak. Imagine, the world would be like if she insists on owning them and exercises right on the choices they make on their own chests. The cornerstone of women’s subordination hinges on the lowly status of her breasts, and it is time these are given the necessary Tits Up.

Tits Up
by Sarah Thronton
Pan Macmillan, London
Extent: 320, Price: Rs. 899.

First published in Deccan Herald

Getting down to business

The central thesis of John Kay’s book on corporations is that “business has evolved but the language that is widely used to describe business has not.” It is a fact that the relationship with business has become more ambivalent. Factories no longer represent the commanding heights of business; the modern business environment, he writes, is characterized by radical uncertainty.

It is a world where companies like Meta, Google, Amazon, Apple rule, and is a world which can be navigated by “assembling the collective knowledge of many individuals and by developing collective intelligence.” Thus, relationships in these modern businesses cannot be “purely transactional: they require groups of people working together towards shared objectives,” and Kay says such an activity has a social as well as a commercial dimension.

Kay carefully examines the change through the years from pure manufacturing to new ways of doing business in The Corporation in the 21st Century. Taking a deeper look at the shifts, Kay thinks that the term ‘capital’ itself means more than just financial capital. New technologies and processes are transforming the manner in which products are being produced. The products that are produced in the process, like smartphones and internet applications, are items that conveniently fit into the pocket. What the consumer ends up paying is towards the collective intelligence in the product design, rather than the transformation of raw material into finished goods. Twenty-first century business needs little capital, mostly does not own the capital it uses and is not controlled by the people who provide that capital, argues Kay.

According to the economists Jonathan Haskel and Stian Westlake, modern business is best described as “capitalism without capital”. Amazon best illustrates it: its market cap over is over $2 trillion and its assets on the balanced sheet totals $585 billion. If you think that Amazon requires large warehouses and vehicles, think again. Its property assets are largely rented from real estate investors and financial institutions. On top of that, Amazon sells its goods before it even pays for them. The change in the corporate landscape is providing a comparative advantage in business methods.

Kay’s book is aimed at the lay reader, but in effect it has been turned into a thoughtful business document. He underscores the point that though capital requirements of new businesses may be relatively modest, the relationship between hard financial capital and soft intellectual capital need to be properly understood. Kay has detailed important factors that are fast transforming businesses. Clearly, business is more than mere profit-making. “What we call ‘profit’ is no longer primarily a return on capital but ‘economic rent’ – which is used to describe the earnings that arise because some people, places and institutions have commercially valuable talents which others struggle to emulate,” writes Kay. ‘Economic rent’ is earned by Taylor Swift or by the enthusiasm of fans of Manchester United, he points out.

In addition to redefining capital, Kay raises two concerns. First, he debunks the notion that business means profit maximization, and second, that shareholder profit is only central to business. Ignoring stakeholders, profit maximization, and reduced capital infusion are not easy issues to grapple with. These three issues put together will contribute significantly to running future businesses.

The modern business hinges around cerebral leaders. “The asset is the capability of individuals and teams within the business to solve problems, to devise and deliver new products and to win the commitment of suppliers and the trust of customers,” says Kay.

The book is a work in progress, and it seems a sequel is already in the works. The factory was once the frontline of the class struggle with trade unions leading the demand for better wages and condition. The class struggle is far from over, and new businesses cannot overlook the question. The economic system Kay favors is a “pluralist economy” where people are free to do new things and fail, without requiring the approval of some central authority.

The Corporations in the 21st Century
by John Kay
Profile/Hachette Books
Extent: 441 pages, Price: Rs. 799.

First published in The Hindu on January 24, 2025.

When relationships turn sour

Set in Texas, this is a story of an Indian immigrant family of four, each of whom has broken free of the shackles of so-called happy co-existence called a family. Suresh and Lata have drifted after decades of marriage, and their grown-up kids Priya and Nikesh have set their sails in search of finding themselves. Navigating online dating, Suresh meets an attractive woman while Lata finds a professor at the college flirting with her newfound independence as a librarian. Nikesh pretends a seemingly perfect marriage whereas Priya harbors a clandestine affair. Each to their own, but not entirely as each one keeps a close eye on the other. Though the family is turned upside down, the glue of relationship still sticks. 

When relationships turn into rituals, lack of imagination triggers their downfall. Even in togetherness, there remains a strong sense of loneliness. Under such conditions, a part of everybody remains hidden in such failed relationships to act like a virtual time bomb ticking to rip things apart.  Feeling suffocating in each other’s company, a part of both Suresh and Lata hoped that there was actually someone out there in the world capable of making them feel joy, maybe even love. In divorce, they found a perfect opportunity for self-reflection and re-valuation. 

A bad relationship may be a two-way street, but divorce isn’t a bad marriage at the end. In this bighearted debut, Deepa Vardarajan pitches the narrative on the premise that every arrangement in life carries with it the sadness, and that there is a space and scope for reigniting relationships all over gain. Nothing is lost till it is lost. In this witty family tale the question that runs through it is: will the loyalty that once rooted the family be strong enough to draw them back together? Will the family members rise above their personal fulfilment, family entanglements, and reignited dreams?

One cannot fail to admire the layered complexity of this beautiful novel about a flawed yet unforgettable family—the interlocking ironies and wounds and strivings for love and clarity and accomplishment and growth, all so deeply embedded in the cultural milieu of the immigrant family. Every character in this engrossing story is as distinct as real, and one can easily draw similarities from daily life. Late Bloomers is a work of delightful, engaging reading.

In a moving narrative, Deepa Vardarajan details the internal predicaments of its characters as they come to terms with the stark realities of life. Their coming together is no less dramatic, the whole family gets to uncover one another’s secrets, confront the limits of love, and explore life’s second chances. The truth of life is unraveled to each one of them in its own little way. Late Bloomers may not have a happy ending to the story, but a promising beginning for sure.

There is a collective learning, and acceptance of common follies as a family. Everyone is found guilty of telling untruths – if not to one another, then to themselves. Certainly, everyone in family is found guilty of that. But probably everyone in the whole world is. Most of the time, what we think of as truth is threaded with self-serving distortions. Late Bloomers has everything you may ask for in a novel. 

Late Bloomers 
by Deepa Vardarajan
Random House, New York 
Extent: 352, Price: Rs. 650.

Commissioned for review by Deccan Herald.

For Mughals the Britishers were an underdeveloped society

It may now be difficult to understand, but the English considered themselves unfortunate to have settled in India much later than other European powers. Strangely, the Portuguese, the French and the Dutch too had similar qualms and of course, all of them squabbled with each other. The Mughal rulers, meanwhile, presided over an expansive, efficient, and fabulously wealthy realm.

Babur, the founder of the Mughal empire in 1525, was as wealthy as the Ming emperor of China. But unlike those who came to plunder India of its incredible riches, his descendants sought to make it their home. Consequentially, the governance of this immense and expanding kingdom was characterized by a central bureaucracy with the emperor as a central authority. After the initial turbulent phase, the empire lasted until 1707. The Alamgir, also known as Aurangzeb, was the last of the Mughal emperors.

Unlike the Europeans who mastered the sea, the Mughuls held sway on land, and as long as they ruled, the former waited at the sea route. Indeed, the English had to wait for the eclipse of the Mughal empire in 1757 before they could advance into India after winning the Battle of Plassey. Internal strife led to the undoing of the empire. In the process, the treasury dropped from a high of 90 million rupees to just about 10 million. The symbolic loss of material possession was a grim indication of how far the Mughals had fallen.

India used to be a place of sweet frag­rances and flavors of spices, an earthly paradise of gems and diamonds. Some of the most lucrative commodities were traded from here. Its share of the world’s GDP was 22.6 percent whereas that of England was a paltry 1.8 percent. During Mughal rule that lasted 200 years, India became one of the largest and most prosperous centralized states in pre-modern history. Nothing which the English traded evoked interest among the Mughuls, who saw little gain in trading with a small, cold island on the other side of the world.

Frustrated that they were making no headway, the English attacked the Mughal entourage to Mecca in 1695. Pilgrims were looted, raped and killed. Most of the attackers were captured and beheaded. Al-Azami argues that while the English approach was built on loot and murder, in the grand scheme of things, it was the Mughals who mattered. Their influence was so great that the English monarch sent ambassador after ambassador to woo the Mughal emperor, who couldn’t be bothered with sending a counterpart.

Mughal history hasn’t been interpreted and written quite like this before. Al-Azami does an appreciable job of revisiting the dynasty through a playful but serious lens. She is particularly mesmerized by the Mughal description of 17th-century England as underdeveloped island nation.

Travellers in the Golden Realm seeks to retrieve forgotten perspectives and to unveil the early picture of England vis-a-vis Mughal India. In the end, what this work does very well is make the reader realize that history is complex and full of nuance.

Travellers in the Golden Realm

by Lubaaba Al-Azami

Hachette, New Delhi

Extent: 302 pages, Price: Rs. 799.

First published in Hindustan Times, January 3, 2025.

There is problem in its making

AI promoters are like the snake oil peddlers of the late 18th and early 19th century in America, who exploited people’s unscientific belief that oil from snakes had various health benefits.

The concoctions sold as snake oil didn’t contain what was claimed, it was largely found to be ineffective and in extreme case led to the loss of life. AI snake oil literally means AI that does not work.

However, it does favor us by shining what may not work because research in more than a dozen AI fields have found far-reaching credibility crises. AI Snake Oil uncovers such rampant claims and warns of the dangers of AI when it is controlled by largely unaccountable big tech corporations.

Amidst so much publicity around AI, an amazing hype around artificial intelligence has been generated at the cost of human wisdom. Driven by the desire to quick fix solutions, the hype comes around with questionable generative and predictive answers. Should it not be the responsibility of researchers to separate the milk from the froth?

The professor-student team of Narayanan and Kapoor at the Princeton University have cut through the hype with some clear and crisp writing on how AI fails us daily, and how it might one day benefit us. Interestingly, they comment on new developments in AI in their newsletter AISnakeoil.com.

Jobs threat

That AI will cause sudden mass joblessness seems farfetched; however, it will change the nature of many jobs and decrease the demand for other jobs. Previous waves of automation had similar impact, albeit more abrupt. When typewriter was replaced by word processer the transformation was significant, as it called for a change in the nature and skill of job.

Rarely been a job category been replaced entirely by technology, only elevator operator seems to have disappeared due to automation. Automation often decreases the number of people working in a job or sector without eliminating it.

Called automation paradox, the most common type of impact is a change in the nature of job duties. Last mile phenomenon of automation is of critical importance: it takes previously done job but creates new types of needs for human labor. For those whose jobs are already automated, however, the prospects could be scary. 

One must appreciate that Narayanan and Kapoor have made things simple, which others have tried to make it complex. AI Snake Oil offers a breath of fresh air about both AIs, predictive and generative.

As of today, predictive AI is not on a firm footing. Falling prey to snake oil is crucial when it is known how it fails and even harms people. The problem is how much data we can have and how effective our models are likely to predict the future. Limits to predicting future based on the past data and concurrent trends is fraught with uncertainty. Machine learning therefore can only generate the plausibility of what the future might hold.

Proponents of AI know the limits but do not want any reputational damage as yet. A 2023 paper claimed that machine learning could predict hit songs with 97 percent accuracy, however, in reality the study’s results are anything but false or even bogus. Earlier studies do bear testimony to it, although such papers about ‘frightening accuracy’ have the potential to revolutionize the music industry.

Who would not want to spin money based on such a hype? Overall, more than a dozen fields have compiled evidence of widespread flaws but none of it has been publicly accepted, but the supply of snake oil comes from companies that want to sell predictive AI.

Capital theory

“Fears about automation/technology are fears about capitalism.” As companies are driven by profit, AI is expected to generate profit. More than technology, it is capital which is at the core of the entire debate. Big Tech companies have gotten so rich off of AI that they can easily mold public perception.

Academic research and tech journalism too are completely dependent on industry funding. It is this aspect that Narayanan and Kapoor have tried to bring up honestly in their book. Painting AI with a single brush is tempting but flawed, they say. AI Snake Oil is all about why there is so much information, misunderstanding, and mythology about AI.

There is a collective learning, but non-acceptance of common follies. Everyone is found guilty of telling untruths – if not to one another, then to themselves. Certainly, everyone in AI fraternity is found guilty of that. Most of the time, what we think of as truth is threaded with self-serving distortions. AI Snake Oil has everything you ever wanted to know about AI. 

AI Snake Oil
by Arvind Narayanan & Sayash Kapoor
Princeton University Press, USA 
Extent: 348 pages. Price; Rs. 699,

First published in the HinduBusinessLine on Nov 25, 2024.

The 'Queens' of Kings

Closely related as mothers, daughters, sisters, half-sisters. and nieces, known with the only name of the Cleopatras, they ruled Egypt for a period of more than a century and a half (192 BCE – 30 BCE). When taken as a collective, the generation of Cleopatras set a new model for female power in antiquity. Together they dominated the politically world of men, in vigor, finesse, ambition, rigor, vision, and ability. All seven were direct blood relatives; and all of them were queens of Egypt. Composed of two Greek words, kleos meaning glory/fame, and pater meaning father/homeland was a big name to live up to.  

Historian Lloyd Llewellyn-Jones tells the dramatic story of these seven incomparable women, vividly tracing the kingdom’s final centuries before its fall to Rome. The Cleopatras were descendants of Ptolemy, the general who conquered Egypt alongside Alexander the Great. They were closely related, and wielded absolute power in overshadowing their husbands or sons. Without fail they all proved to be shrewd and capable leaders. The Cleopatras ruled through the canny deployment of arcane rituals, opulent spectacles, and unparalleled wealth. They negotiated political turmoil and court intrigues, led armies into battle fields and commanded fleets of ships, and ruthlessly dispatched their dynastic rivals. 

Women to remain on top have had to pay a heavy price. The Cleopatra wase a formidable name to matter. It matters as the Cleopatra was the first with a new genuine framework for aligning with active political power. Their collective story is neglected till today, but it shows that how they adjusted to the male-dominated institution. Taken together, theirs is an impeccable narrative on women’s power in the stiflingly patriarchal world. Llewellyn-Jones must be credited for bringing a story of ruthlessness, but also of lifelong determination. 

All the Cleopatras craved for power, and eventually wielded power. Some of the Cleopatras shared the same royal husband, whereas others plotted the overthrow their husbands. Each of the Cleopatras had an interesting story, about surviving marriage, betrayal, murder, violence and loss. The emotional turmoil each of them went through remains more of a speculation. Sex as a lure for power remains hard to comprehend. 

The life and times of each Cleopatras was much complicated. They were the power brokers of the Ptolemaic dynasty, no doubt. Through several successive generations the Cleopatras underplayed their traditional roles as mothers and spouses. While each Cleopatra may have different take on the subject, the compulsion to sustain gender dominance may have the last word. Only by doing so, the Cleopatras could gain time for the Romans takeover.  

At the peak of the Cleopatras rule, the last Cleopatra claimed the lofty title Queen of Kings. The Cleopatra VII demonstrated that women were born to rule over men. Professor Lloyd Llewellyn-Jones offers fresh insights into the real story of the Cleopatras, and the tragic death of the last queen of Egypt.  

The Cleopatras  
by Lloyd Llewellyn-Jones 
Hachette, New Delhi 
Extent: 361, Price: Rs. 999.

First published in Deccan Herald on Nov 10, 2024.

Full-Stomach Environmentalism

Ramachandra Guha may not have done justice to the Indian Environmentalism in his recently published book 'Speaking with Nature'. For those (largely rural) who traditionally viewed 'nature' as a giver of services (natural), only expected saved/protected nature could extend uninterrupted supply of those services. While the Chipko that was borne out of the realization that 'trees' contributed to sustaining those services, its southern version (called the Appiko) serving the same purpose got excluded from the ecological history? Why the variety of response and tenacity of the (eco) service is not appreciated? 

It was in the mid-1980s that the Appiko, a momentous event in the ecological history of the country, had reminded people about the virtues of protecting nature to keep the 'gateway to the monsoons' thriving with natural processes. Not only did this spontaneous social action led to a moratorium on green felling across the Sahyadri range of mountains, but the movement has also been the vanguard of ecological conservation ever since: from opposing a seventh dam on the Kali River in Karnataka to saving the Nilgiris in Tamil Nadu, from taking on the controversial ‘Nylon 66’ project in Goa, and to supporting the Chalakudy river conservation in Kerala. For Guha, it was 'full-stomach environmentalism' (led by the elite) much prevalent during last-1970 and post-1980.

Though the legacy of most of the TEN eminent eco-historians (profiled in the book) remain lost in time, the issue of protecting the ecosystem that generates/protects livelihoods remain alive or at least remained so till the end-of-the-millennium. These individuals demonstrated a combination of love and caring attitude towards nature. Has such love and caring not been essential part of cultural-religious practices in the country for ages? Did the eco-historians ever rebuild those practices by strengthening the environment messages contained therein? As I write this, I do see chhat festival (traditionally celebrated in Bihar) being celebrated in polluted rivers or stagnant muddies all across. The ritualistic value of such mass-based cultural events is socially accepted in most religious festivals, but the essential ecological messages remained lost. 

While there has been an economic turnround in recent times, a shift toward 'full-stomach environmentalism' of the affluent seems apparent. With economy having taken a turnover, only the abject poor expect nature to give them the livelihood services. Rapid urbanization has transformed the country's demography. Environmentalism of the present needs a serious rethinking, as the past-environmentalism seems to have been outdated. 

Guha himself acknowledges that air pollution is relentlessly increasing; most of our rivers are biologically dead; and the chemical contamination of soils remains extremely high. There is a gross political disregard to these issues because legacy of past-environmentalism hasn't contributed anything significant in this regard. Most rivers are in bad shape, and nobody seems concerned even if it flows next door as bottled water is easily available. Did environment consciousness ever address such transformations? Are there any footmarks of the past left for the others to step in?     

Even though climate change is not our creation, India finds itself in an environmental disaster zone. Guha raises it and questions the failure of the environment thinkers to forewarn it. The book offers the thoughts of eminent environmentalists to fertilize our minds, but the profiled minds in this volume have literally fell short of doing so. Not sure why historian E.P.Thompson had remarked "There is not a thought that is being thought in the West or East which is not active in some Indian mind." 

Speaking with Nature
by Ramachandra Guha
Fourth Estate/HarperCollins, New Delhi
Extent: 406 pages, Price: Rs 799.

First published in www.raagdelhi.com

The cognitive brillance

Hyper-efficiency is no longer defined by the quantity of output, but by its quality. And assembly-line flattened minds seem to have given up on this change. With the modern-day workload shifting from the hands to the head, the mind and body do not seem to be in sync. It may mean some kind of redundancy, as if the brain has refused to cooperate. Not really, a car now suddenly stopping in the middle of a busy street is taken to a computer engineer not a car mechanic. Simply put, software has gradually replaced hardware in almost every facet in industrial countries. With technology evolving at fast pace, the change is not far from us.  

Technology has changed and humans seem to have quite a bit of lost control. Unless human brain optimizes to transform the outcome, much of the focus is likely to be lost. Brain doctor Dr. Mithu Storoni has outlined the emerging enigma, and wonders if more than conventional nudge alone can process the information better. The task is to escalate human performance to a new height and improve the way we work. That is what hyper-efficiency is all about, achieving a level of efficiency that has not been achieved.

Creatively written and smarty packed four chapters, Hyper-Efficient packs many ideas and approaches to think and work about. Change the speed is unlikely to bring about the desired result, change the pattern will. From the linear approach to a non-linear rhythmic way is under attention. Marching like solider in a straight line to spinning like a dancer in a rhythm, will create the innovative mental landscape for leaning new ways of problem solving. Only by adopting new approach the tsunami of technological change will be outsmarted.

It is a smart new way of thinking about life. and life processes. The idea finally is to think about identifying the brain’s unseen gears that can make life more elegant. Our brains must navigate like never before, it should navigate the virtual world with imagination at an unprecedented speed. University of Cambridge-trained physician and neuroscientist Dr. Storoni flips through the human brain to suggest game-changing scenario.  If we persist with old kind of assembly-line production system, the ecosystem is never ready to face new challenges. There is no room for flair and brilliance, there is hardly any out-of-the box thinking.

It is true of the Angkor, which became the largest preindustrial city in the world. It had tamed uncertainty by collecting water. The same innovation that had transformed Angkor, the medieval capital of the ancient Khmer empire, led to its dazzling downfall. The city had eliminated uncertainty altogether, and in the process forgot to cope with it should it reoccur. A bit of chaos in the system can make the system more resilient to unexpected shocks. The system had adopted linearity at the cost of ignoring rhythm, out-of-box thinking was compromised.

Hyper-Efficient is book that helps the reader shut out distractions to concentrate on high-level achievement. If one is less distracted, one can sleep better during night and perform better during the day. Who doesn’t know it! The book explores and explains human brain to do things differently, and ready for doing what is essentially out of the course. It unlocks the brain, realizes full potential to its optimum mental performance. It is a book of discovery, that helps discover one’s mind.

Hyper.Efficiency
by Mithu Storoni
Hachette, New Delhi
Extent: 266 pages, Price: Rs. 599.

First published in www.raagdelhi.com on Oct, 4, 2024

Big Brother is watching you

In the year 2024, it’s indeed a surprise to describe the relevance of George Orwell as an author and as a cultural product. Orwell’s endearing fame as a writer and a thinker, and his critique of authoritarianism with the emphasis on disinformation, manifests itself in Animal Farm and Nineteen Eighty-Four, two of his dystopian novels translated into an excess of 65 languages. Both books are on best-selling lists even now. Published within a gap of four years in 1945 and 1949, the language of both the novels continues to echo across politics and culture. The world that Orwell prophesied hasn’t come to pass, on the contrary, his words offer sharp lessons for the contemporary world, says Laura Beers in her new book, Orwell’s Ghosts (2024). In her Introduction, the British historian who teaches at American University writes that invocations of Orwell’s words have reached new heights, with both the right and the left appropriating them to suit their ends.

After the January 6, 2021 “insurrection” at Capitol Hill in Washington D.C., Republican senator Josh Hawley compared the cancellation of his book contract to life in Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty Four, notes Beers. The left too, she writes, has embraced the rhetoric of Orwellianism to depict either Donald Trump or Boris Johnson. The term, Orwellian, has been used to depict Vladimir Putin’s “attempts to manage information on the Ukraine war.”

She quotes the literary scholar John Rodden who in a study made a distinction between Orwell the man and “Orwell”, the cultural product, which offers a valuable lens for considering how both Orwell and his books have been repeatedly reappropriated for various political ends.

‘Big Brother’ is still a synonym for a totalitarian surveillance state, which has recently been co-opted as the title of a popular reality show. Orwell questioned the presence of the ‘big brother’ and the surveillance state, contending that both reflect the emergence of a fascist state. The Spanish Civil War was a crucial turning point in Orwell’s life; both the novels came after the civil war, and a newfound commitment to socialism. Had Spain not awakened Orwell to write these iconic books, he would not have championed individual liberty as a cause. Beers says Orwell was a “broad and deep thinker who opposed inequality as fervently as he opposed censorship and tyranny.”

“The real frightening thing about totalitarianism,” said Orwell, “is not that it commits ‘atrocities’ but that it attacks the concept of objective truth; it claims to control the past as well as the future.” The attack on truth and language makes atrocities possible. The atrocities are easy to commit, if truth has been silenced as the first victim. Once people are terrorized into silence, obedience, and lies, it becomes easier for an authoritarian administration to take the next steps. Beers shows why the present generation must value Orwell’s politics and what must be learnt from his thoughts. Although he died in 1950, when he was only 47, his life was full of eventful and interesting episodes. Orwell’s childhood seems to have been divided between the freedom and the pleasure of life outdoors, and the regimentation and misery of the schools he lived at from age eight to eighteen.

Beers says the question that bedeviled Orwell for the final dozen years of his life was whether and how a socialist society could be achieved that offered its citizens economic security and social equality without devolving into authoritarianism. She warns against replacing the complexity of his political thought with a two-dimensional caricature of Orwell as an anti-totalitarian prophet. In considering his writing, Beers draws attention to at least “one blind spot”, his inability to appreciate the negative impact of patriarchal structures on interwar women. “Orwell was a socialist, but decidedly not a feminist,” she notes.

Though he wasn’t exemplary, argues Rebecca Solnit, he was nevertheless courageous and committed. Orwell managed to love both Englishmen and loathe the British Empire, to be an advocate for underdogs and outsiders. “He was a rebel against his own biological condition, and he was a rebel against social conditions; the two were very closely linked together.” Solnit’s Orwell’s Roses challenges the conventional image of Orwell as a gloomy figure always fighting for a cause. The commitment to the things of this world could also be the focus of a spiritual discipline, a warmth he saw Gandhi was lacking. Our job is to make life worth living on this earth, Gandhi had said, because this is the only earth we have.

Orwell’s Ghosts and Orwell’s Roses are two contrasting studies. While the first explores his commitment to political liberty and economic justice, the second examines his aesthetics and ethics. If one were to count Orwell’s single achievement, it would be the fact that he named and described, as no one else had, the way that totalitarianism was a threat not just to liberty and human rights, but to language and consciousness as well. His essays laid the ground for his diverse political thoughts. Without doubt, Orwell is the perfect guide to our own age of upheaval.

Orwell’s sense of social justice was his most outstanding characteristic, his friends attest. In the nearly seventy-five years since his death, the emphasis of his political thought is well established. While we must stand up against oppressive regimes abroad, we must also take ownership of how and why similar populist and anti-democratic tendencies are corrupting our domestic political system. Orwell took a dim view of the role of religion in society; he believed it principally divided society. Revisiting Orwell is like visiting our recent pasts and our current upheaval. The work he did is everyone’s job now.

Orwell’s Roses

by Rebecca Solnit

Granta, London

Extent:308, Price: UK 9.99.

Orwell’s Ghosts

by Laura Beers

Hurst, London

Extent: 222, Price: Rs. 399.

First published at The Hindu, dated Oct 17, 2024.

Eat what is not (un)popular

Our choice of food is driven by our cultural standing and the social structure we belong to. What we eat must determine our social status, and it does so by telling us about our identity in the society. The dominant food is what is essentially elitist in its creation. The elitist menu is what each geographical region has on its range, guided primarily by what is hugely popular amongst the elite. What is palatable to the mainstream gets popular coverage and becomes the identity of the region itself. An individual’s eating practices play a vital role in determining social status, which is closely aligned with class divisions.

What the poor (or the Dalits) eat every day? The social walls of caste and class are so strong that the upper castes never get to know about the food culture of the lower castes. In other words, the food culture of the upper caste/class has been considered the food culture of the entire society. Come to think of it, the food culture of most marginalized social groups continues to get ignored. Written as a memoir with recipes, Shahu Patole's Dalit Kitchens of Marathwada explores the politics of food culture and how it reinforces social divisions. However, food also holds the transformative power to connect communities and preserve cultural identity.

Like the food culture of Punjab is narrowed down to makke-ki-roti and sarson-ka-saag, and the Konkan region gets distinction as a land for fish, curry, and crab, the Maharashtra as a whole is summed up into puran poli, aloo bonda, and kande poha. The identity of regions is equated to particular dishes, all belonging to the upper-class. In the process, a vast local biodiversity gets missed out. Many traditions and practices are equally lost, and so are essential components of the recipe. These recipes can’t be recreated as these are based on the local products, local practices, and local wisdom.

Dalit kitchens offer an exquisite culinary landscape. The wide variants of bhakri are in vogue but only the generic is commonly consumed - pithala bhakri (gram-flour and sorghum roti), khandeshi bhakri (mashed eggplant curry), varhadi bhakri (coarsely ground chillies and garlic) and many others are often ignored.

Food chronicler Shahu Patole has drawn the rich repository of dalit culinary traditions. Cooking is a time-consuming process, women being at the centre of what finally gets cooked. That is not all, cooking entails a great deal of attention to detail, and warmth and affection. Far from being documented, the cooking practice is only sustained through inter-generational transfer of recipe. What is ignored gets lost forever! Patole has made a pioneering effort to document dalit food culture and history, through the culinary practices of two communities – Mahar and Mang.

Why should the dalit kitchens get such a significance? Should the culinary skills of the poor be counted? What is its use in the social structure? They are probably so far in the social and cultural façade to deserve any attention. Yet, they deserve attention. For instance, many beans are best suited under dry situations and may have multiple usage under varying climatic conditions. As dalits use less oil for cooking, the recipe could be healthy. There could be numerous uses the dalit recipe can be put to, provided it gets systematically studied.

Dalit Kitchens of Marathwada is a book of culture and customs. It shows many culinary traditions as special dishes. There is something novel about their novel food culture. However, there is little doubt that dalit food culture was often ignored. Many dalits don’t acknowledge what their forefathers ate, the deep-rooted shame and guilt continue to disturb them. The process of erasing social history has already begun. It would be rather naïve to assume that the woke writers and bloggers are oblivious to this development.

Dalit Kitchens of Marathwada

by Shahu Patole

HarperCollins, New Delhi

Extent: 356, Price: Rs. 599.

Commissioned by the Hindustan Times, Printed on www.raagdelhi.com on Oct 8, 2024. 

Transition to a renewable economy

The good news is that many businesses have started seeing growth opportunities in the green economy, and the bad news is that the urgency of transiting to a renewable resource-based economy is still at a distance from making a credible impact. Given the current pace of transition to renewable economy, it may seem a matter of two steps forward and one step back.  But Steven Cohen remains optimistic about the glass getting full as the transition passes the tipping point of popular acceptance. Such is the urgency that politically polarized countries may have little reason to avoid a unified response. 

Environmentally Sustainable Growth focuses on how the maintenance of material wealth without jeopardizing natural ecosystems in the United States has run apace, as a model in ecological leadership for the developing countries. Quoting the environmental sustainability initiatives by over a hundred leading private companies, Cohen makes it clear that government’s proactive role is critical for on-the-ground action by the private sector. Can use of smartphone technologies to invent products that consume fewer resources than traditional business models be reason enough to be valued in this transition? Often discounted, wealth accumulation by the tech-giants rarely generates enough income opportunities for the society to actively contribute to the transition. This is likely to be a stumbling block in the proposed transition to the renewable economy.    

New technologies, new services, new knowledge and new jobs are emerging, but there remain plenty of unsustainable business practices in the world. And the people who benefit from those businesses do not shy about defending it. No wonder, therefore, that those whose jobs are under threat offer resistance to sustainability everywhere. Given the fact that the transition to renewable economy will mainly take place in the private sector, developing robust and non-partisan regulatory mechanism by the government is critical to ensure that the benefits get equitable shared across the society. Cohen describes a range of public policy and infrastructure initiatives that can encourage cleaner production but doesn’t emphasize its impact on socio-economic realities of the participating societies.

The director of the Earth Institute’s Research Program on Sustainability Policy and Management at the Columbia University, Steven Cohen offers a pragmatic approach on how societies can transform themselves to become more sustainable. Written with rigor and concern, Cohen proposes a set of inter-related pragmatic responses to environmental challenges but cautions that the transition to environmental sustainability will only take place in stages. Optimistic expectations are that the transition in the United States will be well underway by 2030, and largely completed by mid-century. The book depicts an appealing and equitable future that assures quality of life while protecting the planet.

Environmentally Sustainable Growth is an ambitious and optimistic undertaking to trigger credible response from governments, institutions and the society to survive and thrive. Counting inherent goodness in people, Cohen lays stress on breaking through ignorance, blind ideology and misplaced priorities to make the planet a valuable habitat for all living creatures, now and in future. It is a multidisciplinary book that will be informative for students, practitioners, analysts, and academics whose work focuses on environmental sustainability.

Cohen counts environmental crises as an opportunity to forge our collective wisdom to transit into another way of living possibility.  

Environmentally Sustainable Growth 
by Steven Cohen

Columbia University Press, New York

Extent: 216 pages, Price: US$ 30 

First published in the Hindustan Times (Premium), Oct 8, 2024.

Unequal World

Professors of Economics at MIT and Stanford University respectively, Daron Acemoglu and Simon Johnson, are concerned and somewhat convinced that political power hasn’t leveraged industrial progress to usher prosperity for the teeming millions. If it was automated textile factories who left their workers oppressed at the cost of enriching the owners a century ago, it is now the turn of digital technologies to further widen the socio-economic gulf. The situation is unlikely to change, argue the authors, if the power to make all major decisions remain in the hands of autocratic regimes and a few hubristic tech leaders.

The authors revisit an age-old question: has technological progress meant prosperity for all? Assessing our thousand-year history, from the neolithic agricultural revolution to the ascent of artificial intelligence today, it becomes clear that the idea of shared prosperity continues to remain a distant dream. The geographical locations of technological changes contributed to the direction of technology and the type of progress in different parts of the world: western Europe and China became the centre for agriculture; Britain and the U.S. for the industrial revolution, and the U.S. and China for digital technologies. While different countries had different takes on technology adoption earlier on, its implication on the leading economies led to technologies being forced on the rest of the world subsequently. Such an approach remains far from inclusive as it broadly contributed to the wealth of those who pushed it.

What makes Power and Progress engrossing reading has much to do with the innumerable case stories that justify enthusiasm for technical change at the cost of crippling a large majority. Francis Bacon and the story of fire; Lesseps’ quest for building the Panama Canal; Stephenson’s wagon ways to move coal; McCormick’s machine tools for crop harvesting; and the techno-optimism of Bill Gates and Elon Musk shakes the reader to realize that across history it is the winner-take-technologies that has enforced more inequality and violence on global society. The realpolitik of technology for economic change is skewed, as there are two sides to technology. Acemoglu and Johnson give a large number of examples where progress in technology has led to huge gains for the rich at the expense of perceived recipients. That, according to them, is pretty much the history of the relationship between technological progress and people.

Technology is propagated for the promise it upholds but the benefits accrue after a very long time, and at times quite on the contrary. Better ships did help in trading, but it promoted slavery by shipping lakhs of black people. Back in 1871, Karl Marx had remarked that constant improvements in technology would create a vast reserve army of the unemployed. Over a century later, his words seem to be coming true as the promised transformation of life by artificial intelligence holds the possibility to make life worse for most people. John Keynes’ century-old lingering concerns about ‘technological unemployment’ are back in serious contention.

To reduce negative impacts on society, the authors suggest that debates on new technology ought to center not just on the brilliance of new products but also on whether they are working for the people or against people. To this end, Acemoglu and Johnson enlist a number of suggestions on what must be done to regulate privately-owned technologies that have inbuilt negative externalities for society.

Power and Progress is a fascinating narrative on technology and its effects through history and concludes that the “society and its powerful gatekeepers need to stop being mesmerized by tech billionaires and their agenda.” It is a must-read book that is revealing and reflective on progress that is never automatic unless society unites against the brute power of technology corporations. It is essential reading for everyone who not only cares about the present, but as much about the future of democracy to sustain society. 

Power and Progress 

by Daron Acemoglu & Simon Johnson 

Hachette, New Delhi

Extent:  Price: Rs. 899.

First published in The Hindu, Sept 06, 2024.

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The roadmap to virtuous existence

There has never been as much fear and stress in human life as today. The fear of having less and the greed for more have put most of our lives on edge. Medicines do help in addressing exigencies, but stress continues to brew insidiously. Rarely has any age in recent times escaped it as stress has become more of a norm than the exception in modern living.

Consequently, emotional bandwidth has shrunk, with people trying different mechanisms to expand it. In a world with an uncertain future, coping with stress has gained currency. Stress manifests in material gains but doesn’t guarantee contentment and peace.  Happiness without ‘desire’,and having without ‘want’ are hard to achieve, but remain quintessential elements for a stress-free existence. 

For this reason, the age-old Stoicism doctrine has regained popularity. It calls for accepting things as they are, without attempting to change them. In doing so, Epictetus (55-135 BC) is credited with making humans more resilient and more virtuous. Born a slave, he philosophized the concept of stoicism that was started in 300 BC by Zeno. In recent times, however, Ryan Holiday has made it relevant by giving the concept a local flavor by giving it a contemporary relevance.

We may have forgotten Harry Truman, the US President during the Second World War, but his words of wisdom continue to resonate: ‘The man who is capable to cultivate moderation, wisdom, justice and fortitude will remain happy’. Holiday draws upon the lives of contemporary heroes for reigniting stoicism. In his latest treatise ‘Right Thing, Right Now’, Holiday pulls real-life nuggets from the lives of activists, athletes, and diplomats to illustrate how life can be made more virtuous. 

Be it the lived experiences of the likes of tennis legend Arthur Ashe and investor Buckminster Fuller, Holiday makes the 2000-year-old philosophy come alive for the reader to draw a framework for living a content life. Short episodes from the lives of contemporaries provide what the reader must do in personal, communal, and social spheres. Becoming thoughtful observers is critical to identifying and locating the sources of distress and worries. The episodes are far from aspirational as Holiday adds value by analyzing them from a stoic lens.

As stoicism is about taking control of one’s thoughts and emotions, Holiday helps the reader for inspiration and the power that comes along as one is able to transform oneself. The book is about the ‘right things to be done right now’.

Right thing, right now

by Ryan Holiday

Profile books, UK

Extent: 229. Price: Rs. 399.

First published in www.raagdelhi.com on September 23, 2024.