It's been a long time since I did the stroll with Arundhati Roy. Her first novel. The God of Small Things, hit me hard, and I loved it dearly, but after that she ditched fiction and started writing politically oriented stuff. I caught some of it, and it was good, but I really wanted more of that fiction. But when I saw this compendium of her political writings, I knew I would have to have it. And I got a great deal in it at Half-Price Books...I think it was $6. But it's been sitting on my shelf for quite a while now.
Last night I watched The New Corporation--a sequel to one of my favorite documentaries (The Corporation, in case you hadn't guessed), and I was so shocked and aghast and angry that I knew that I had to DDR this book right away.
xxv+ 1,000 = 1,025 pages, so I'm going to be here for awhile.
Day 1 (DDRD 2,668) February 18, 2025
Read to page 24.
At the end of a searing Foreword, Arundhati Roy writes, "The World Wildlife Fund reports that the population of vertebrates-- mammals, birds, fish, amphibians, and reptiles--has declined by 60 percent in the last forty years. We have sentenced ourselves to an era of sudden catastrophes--wild fires and strange storms, earthquakes and flash floods. To guide us through it all, we have the steady hand of new imperialists in China, white supremacists in the White House, and benevolent neo-Nazis on the streets of Europe." (xxiv)
I also finished the first essay, "The End of Imagination," which was an indictment of an Indian nuclear bomn test. It was very pass, and very scary.
Might have to read some more of this later today.
2 (DDRD 2,669) February 19, 2025
Read to page 55.
"The Greater Common Good" is a long essay...a tad bit over 50 pages...and it is just stunning. As I read...and mourn...I keep thinking, "This is the future of America under Emperor Trump." You can find it for free in PDF form at several sites online, but I prefer the Internet Archive, so here's a link to that:
https://archive.org/details/greatercommongoo0000roya
It's a stunning piece if writing, well worth your perusal. Here are a few highlights:
"India's poorest people are subsidizing the lifestyles of her richest." (33)
Which is, of course, also true of the U.S.S.A. these days.
"...eventually, in a courtroom or to a committee, no argument works as well as a Fait Accompli." (42)
Speaking of Trump, that's his modus operandi. And it really, really works, I'm sorry to say.
"...if you take into account the power needed to pump water through its vast network of canals, the Sardar Sarovar projects will end up consuming more electricity than they produce!" (44)
Because the point isn't to serve The People, but to use their needs as a fulcrum to expand the wealth of the ruling class.
"Forgive me for letting my heart wander." (54)
Which is one of the things that distinguishes Arundhati Roy from, say, Noam Chomsky. She writes from the heart, and lets it wander when it must.
Day 3 (DDRD 2,670) February 20, 2025
Read to page 85.
This should be a Found Poem: "This is fascist math. It strangles stories. Bludgens detail. And manages to blind perfectly reasonable people with spurious, shiny vision." (59)
Finished "The Greater Common Good," which is a Must Read, and got about halfway through "Power Politics," which is looking to be in that same category. (And it is also available via Internet Archive, @ https://archive.org/details/powerpolitics00roya/mode/1up .)
This one is focused on the power industry in India, and once again it is jyst eye-popping. The callous disregard for the poor, the corruption, the waste.... It's stunning that this can happen with such regularity.
Day 4 (DDRD 2,671) February 21, 2025
Read to page 115. Today was moving back home day for Joe, so no time to take reading notes.
Day 5 (DDRD 2,672) February 22, 2025
Read to page 149. Did a few extra pages to finish the "War is Peace" essay. Reading it and thus reliving the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks made me see the Trump administration's actions as very similar. He's simply doing to us what we've done to poor nations around the world. Suppressing dissent and freedom of the press. Subjugation the poor and women. Feeding big business. You can't help but fear where this will all end.
Day 6 (DDRD 2,673) February 23, 2025
Read to page 186. (Church, early.)
Tell me if this sounds familiar: "Right now we're sipping from a poisoned chalice — a flawed democracy laced with religious fascism. Pure arsenic." (161)
It's just amazing to see how The Trump Plan has already played out in India...and no doubt in other countries as well.
" This kind of democracy is the problem, not the solution. Our society's greatest strength is being turned into her deadliest enemy. What's the point of us all going on about "deepening democracy," when it's being bent and twisted into something unrecognizable? " (170)
"There is a very real grievance here. And the fascists didn't create it. But they have seized upon it, upturned it, and forged from it a hideous, bogus sense of pride. They have mobilized human beings using the lowest common denominator — religion. People who have lost control over their lives, people who have been uprooted from their homes and communities, who have lost their culture and their language, are being made to feel proud of something. Not something they have striven for and achieved, not something they can count as a personal accomplishedment, but something they just happen to be. Or, more accurately, something they happen not to be. And the falseness, the emptiness, of that pride is fueling a gladiatorial anger that is then directed toward a simulated target that has been wheeled into the amphitheater." (174)
It's VERY hard to believe that Arundhati Roy is not talking about Trump America here...but this was written about 2002 India.
Day 7 (DDRD 2,674) February 24, 2025
Read to page 226.
Here's another bit of 2002 India which sounds very 2025 USA:
"The two arms of the Indian government have evolved the perfect pincer action. While one arm is busy selling India off in chunks, the other, to divert attention, is orchestrating a howling, baying chorus of Hindu nationalism and religious fascism. It is conducting nuclear tests, rewriting history books, burning churches, and demolishing mosques. Censorship, surveillance, the suspension of civil liberties and human rights, the questioning of who is an Indian citizen and who is not, particularly with regard to religious minorities, are all becoming common practice now." (222)
Somewhere along the line in today's readings or in my Googling about based on the readings (it was a blurry morning), I ran across a mention of a Noam Chomsky book that had been suppressed by the publisher: Counter-Revolutionary Violence: Bloodbaths in Fact and Propaganda by Noam Chomsky and Edward S. Herman (Andover: Warner Modular Publications, 1973). Here's the story according to Wikipedia:
"Warner Publishing decided to shut down Warner Modular before CRV could be published. The print run was not initially destroyed because of contractual obligations, but the book was passed on to MSS Information Corporation for promotion and distribution after Warner Publishing shut down Warner Modular. However, MSS engaged in no promotion, as it was not a commercial publishing company and had no distribution facilities. Only 500 copies of the 20,000-copy printing survived. Radical America obtained and distributed some copies, because its staff already knew of CRV's existence. According to Chomsky, the rest were "pulped," not burned." And there's a bit more on the story at
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Counter-Revolutionary_Violence:_Bloodbaths_in_Fact_%26_Propaganda
if you want the rest.
Of course, if "someone" says I can't have something, I immediately want it more, so I went for a lookabout. Found this on GoodReads:
Thomas Ray
1,360 reviews · 470 followers
February 1, 2025
This is the book that Warner Publishing destroyed all remaining copies of--and put Warner Modular Communications out of business for trying to distribute it. Only 22 worldcat libraries in the world have a copy. amazon.com has none.
https://archive.org/details/CounterRevolutionaryViolenceBloodbathsInFactAndPropaganda/mode/1up
And if you don't like that, I also found it on Chomsky.com:
https://chomsky.info/counter-revolutionary-violence/
So yeah, I might have to make a side-trip on that later today.
Meanwhile, Arundhati Roy's writing continues to amaze, astound, frighten, enlighten, and move me. She is a truly great writer.
Day 8 (DDRD 2,675) February 25, 2025
Read to page 258. Also finished reading Herovit's World today. So that's where my reading notes went.
Day 9 (DDRD 2,676) February 26, 2025
Read to page 320.
"...modern democracies have been around for long enough for neoliberal capitalists to learn how to subvert them. They have mastered the technique of infiltrating instruments of democracy--the "independent" judiciary, the "free" press, the parliament-- and molding them to their purpose. The project of corporate globalization has cracked the code. Free elections, a free press, and an independent judiciary mean little when the free market has reduced them to commodities on sale to the highest bidder." (263)
Arundhati makes a reference to a book entitled Redemption Song: Muhammad Ali and the Spirit of the Sixties (by Mike Marqusee) which looks interesting. Good thing for me as I was running out of books to read.
And now a word from our 🧠💣🎇 Department:
"[Mandela] instituted a program of privatization and structural adjustment, leaving millions of people homeless, jobless, and without water and electricity." (289)
Explanation? "Lula and Mandela are, by any reckoning, magnificent men. But the moment they cross the floor from the opposition into government, they become hostage to a spectrum of threats--most malevolent among them, the threat of capital flight, which can destroy any government overnight. To imagine that a leader's personal charisma and a résumé of struggle will dent the corporate cartel is to have no understanding of how capitalism works, or for that matter how power works. Radical change will not be negotiated by governments; it can only be enforced by people." (289)
I love Arundhati Roy, but I wasn't about to take her word on this. So I Googled:
https://www.herinst.org/BusinessManagedDemocracy/government/privatisation/SAfrica.html
https://www.cadtm.org/South-Africa-s-failed-infrastructure-privatisation-and-deregulation
https://socialistworker.org/2013/12/09/when-mandela-was-president
https://www.economist.com/international/1999/09/09/the-painful-privatisation-of-south-africa
Well, fuck. This is like finding out that Martin Luther King, Jr., was an FBI plant in Operation Crush Negroes.
Ain't there a man who can say, "No more!" ?
Still there is more: "The government is conducting an extraordinary dual orchestra. While one arm is busy selling off the nation's assets in chunks, the other, to divert attention, is arranging a baying, howling deranged chorus of cultural nationalism. The inexorable ruthlessness of one process feeds directly into the insanity of the other." (302 - 303)
I was wondering how much this book was going for online ($10.49 to $124...the latter for a signed hardcover) when I found out that this
Mother Mary Comes to Me: A Memoir by Arundhati Roy
is due out September 2nd. Hot diggity.
Day 10 (DDRD 2,677) February 27, 2025
Read to page 354.
Well...here's a thing: "The Iraqi resistance is fighting on the frontlines of the battle against empire. And therefore that battle is our battle." (342) Woah. That's going to upset a lot of U.S.Americans.
Day 11 (DDRD 2,678) February 28, 2025
Read to page 413.
Day 12 (DDRD 2,679) March 1, 2025
Read to page 443.
"On 2002, Narendra Modi's government planned and executed the Gujarat genocide. * In the elections that took place a few months after the genocide, he was returned to power with an overwhelming majority. He ensured complete impunity for those who had participated in the killings." (422 - 423)
And yet another familiar tremor of fear: "Those at the top of the food chain, those who have no reason to want to alter the status quo, are most likely to be the manufacturers of the "counterfeit universe." (428)
Or this: "The editor of the Hindustan Times said, 'Modi may be a mass murderer, but he's our mass murderer,' and went on to air his dilemmas about how to deal with a mass murderer who is also a 'good' chief minister." (428)
Good lord. Is it possible that Modi is even worse than Trump?
* "According to official figures, the riots ended with 1,044 dead, 223 missing, and 2,500 injured. Of the dead, 790 were Muslim and 254 Hindu. The Concerned Citizens Tribunal Report estimated that as many as 1,926 may have been killed. Other sources estimated death tolls in excess of 2,000. Many brutal killings and rapes were reported on as well as widespread looting and destruction of property. Narendra Modi, then Chief Minister of Gujarat and later Prime Minister of India, was accused of condoning the violence, as were police and government officials who allegedly directed the rioters and gave lists of Muslim-owned properties to them."
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2002_Gujarat_riots
Day 13 (DDRD 2,680) March 2, 2025
Read to page 473.
"The question here, really, is, what have we done to democracy? What have we turned it into? What happens once democracy has been used up? When it has been hollowed out and emptied of meaning? What happens when each of its institutions has metastasized into something dangerous? What happens now that democracy and the free market have fused into a single predatory organism with a thin, constricted imagination that revolves almost entirely around the idea of maximizing profit? Is it possible to reverse this process? Can something that is mutated go back to being what it used to be?" (464)
Day 14 (DDRD 2,681) March 3, 2025
Read to page 510. 527.
Here's a new good word (for me):
Psephology (/sɪˈfɒlədʒi/; from Greek ψῆφος, psephos, 'pebble') is the study of elections and voting. Psephology attempts to both forecast and explain election results.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psephology
Day 15 (DDRD 2,682) March 4, 2025
Read to page 557.
Day 16 (DDRD 2,683) March 5, 2025
Read to page 615. (Ash Wednesday...I sat in the car and read while Jacqueline sang like a little 😇. )
"830 million people of India...live on less then Rs 20 (40 cents a day), [they are] the ones who starve, while millions of tons of food grain are either eaten by rats in government warehouses or burnt in bulk (because it is cheaper to burn food than to distribute it to poor people). They are the parents of the tens of millions of malnourished children in our country, of the 2 million who die every year before they reach the age of five. They are the millions who make up the chain gangs that are transported from city to city to build the New India. Is this what is known as enjoying the 'fruits of modern development'?" (573)
How is this even possible in the 21st century? 40 cents per day is $146 a year. I spent almost that much for television this month, and there are people in India...millions of people...who have to live on that for a YEAR? Sometimes I'm surprised that the whole world is burned down by mistreated people.
More:
"To imagine that Sonia and Rahul Gandhi are in charge of the government would be a mistake. The real power has passed into the hands of a coven of oligarchs--judges, bureaucrats, and politicians. They in turn are run like prize racehorses by the few corporations who more or less own everything in the country. They may belong to different political parties and put up a great show of being political rivals, but that's just subterfuge for public consumption. The only real rivalry is the business rivalry between corporations." (578 - 579)
 |
| Jet approves of Arundhati Roy. |
In other news...I waschecking Arundhati Roy's Wikipedia page to see how old she was when she was running around in the jungle with the "Maoists" in "Walking With the Comrades" * when I noticed this:
Notable awards
National Film Award for Best Screenplay (1988)
Say what? A little more Googling around revealed that the movie was In Which Annie Gives it Those Ones (1989), and Arundhati Roy not only wrote it, but acted in it as well. And wonder of wonders, it's available in full on YouTube.
https://youtu.be/A8kdVMxoJ9w?si=4bIpFuqGRaD0_Fbu
In other news...tell me if this sound familiar:
There is a proposal that "a panel of carefully chosen people will administer a giant bureaucracy.... The Lokpal will have the powers of investigation, surveillance, and prosecution. Except for the fact that it won't have its own prisons, it will function as an independent administration, meant to counter the bloated, unaccountable, corrupt one that we already have. Two oligarchies instead of just one." (614)
* Published in 2010, thus she was 49.
Day 17 (DDRD 2,684) March 6, 2025
Read to page 649.
"This awful crisis has been forged out of the utter failure of India's representative democracy, in which the legislature are made up of criminals and millionaires, politicians who have ceased to represent its people. In which not a single democratic institution is accessible to ordinary people. Do not be fooled by the flag waving. We are watching India being carved up in a war for suzerainty* that is as deadly as any battle being waged by the warlords of Afghanistan, only with much, much more at stake." (617)
* suzerainty (noun)
su·zer·ain·ty ˈsü-zə-rən-tē -ˌrān-; ˈsüz-rən-
: the dominion of a suzerain : overlordship
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/suzerainty
In the course of today's reading, Arundhati made reference to a book entitled The Trojan Horse: A Radical Look at Foreign Aid by Steve Weissan. It sounded interesting, but when I checked around, it was pricey ($30 to $90 on Amazon). Internet Archive, perhaps? Yep.
https://archive.org/details/trojanhorseradic0000unse/page/n7/mode/1up
Sigh. I'm not going to live long enough to get anywhere near the bottom of my To Be Read list.
Day 18 (DDRD 2,685) March 7, 2025
Read to page 697.
Speaking of books, here's some more that sound interesting:
Thy Will be Done: The Conquest of the Amazon: Nelson Rockefeller and Evangelism in the Age of Oil by Charlotte Dennett and Gerard Colby available at https://archive.org/search?query=Thy+Will+be+Done%3A+The+Conquest+of+the+Amazon+%3A+Nelson+Rockefeller+and+Evangelism+in+the+Age+of+Oil
The Book Your Church Doesn't Want You To Read By Tim C. Leedom available at https://archive.org/details/isbn_9780840389084
And here's a bit about "DEI" that somebody needs to hear:
"The presumption is that "merit" exists in an ahistorical social vacuum and that the advantages that come from privileged-caste social networking and the establishment's entrenched hostility towards the subordinate castes are not factors that deserve consideration. In truth, "merit" has become a euphemism for nepotism." (684)
I picked up Drowned Out (2002) from the library a few days ago, and started watching it today. Arundhati Roy narrates parts of it, and appears onscreen as well. It's the devastatingly sad story of the people in a village which will be flooded out once the Narmada dam is completed. It's also the story of how the native villagers...who had lived in the area for st least 250 years...were lied to and cheated by the government, which promised far more than it delivefed, and left the people in hopeless, abject poverty.
Day 19 (DDRD 2,686) March 8, 2025
Read to page 730.
Wow. So Gandhi was kind of an asshole?
Day 20 (DDRD 2,687) March 9, 2025
Read to page 760. So only about 100 text pages to go.
Here's what Gandhi's chief lieutenant had to say about "the Mahatma's" attitude towards Untouchables:
"Mahatmaji wants you to look upon so-called untouchables as you do at the cow and the dog and other harmless creatures." (752)
Although it's not stated as such it seems that Arundhati is suggesting that Ambedkar was a better leader (and a much better man) than Gandhi. Hmmm. I am going to have to have a look at this feller.
More uh-oh:
"Naturally the Untouchables expected full support from Mr Gandhi to their satyagraha against the Hindus the object of which was to establish their right to take water from public wells and to enter public Hindu temples. Mr Gandhi however did not give his support to the satyagraha. Not only did he not give his support, he condemned in strong terms." (756)
What the actual fuck?????
Day 21 (DDRD 2,688) March 10, 2025
Read to page 786. Which is a few pages short of my 30 pages per day goal, so I might come back to this later, but since it was where the very long essay ended, I thought I'd stop and catch my breath.
In this very long (over 100 pages) essay "The Doctor and the Saint" (actually a very long Introduction in a critical edition of a book entitled Annihilation of Caste by B. R. Ambedkar), Arundhati Roy makes reference to another Ambedkar book, Buddha and His Dharma. Sounds pretty interesting, and yes, it us available from our friends at Internet Archive:
https://archive.org/details/in.gov.ignca.15980/mode/1up
Arundhati's writing here was different from the other pieces in this omnibus. There was less "frivolity" and playfulness, a much more serious tone. Which is, of course to be expected, given the venue in which it was first published, but still it was a bit disorienting. It made me wish that she had written an introduction for the piece so that we could ease our way into it. All in all, it was very interesting and informative. But I still got a little whiplash making my way through it.
Day 22 (DDRD 2,689) March 11, 2025
Read to page 820.
On the last (and titular) essay...except for the two parter in the Appendix. Looks like only days left for this book.
Day 23 (DDRD 2,690) March 12, 2025
Read to page 860...the last text page. Also finished the Endnotes (pages 870 to 956). So just a little clean-up batting to go--acknowledgements, glossary, index. Pretty sure I can take of that later today. Time to decide what comes next, then.
The Indian army was deployed internally...against minority groups. Another blueprint for Trumpy McTrumpy.
Speaking of (👆):
"What is happening right now is actually a systematic effort to create chaos, an attempt to arrive at a situation in which the civil rights enshrined in the Indian Constitution can be suspended. The RSS has never accepted the constitution. It has now, finally, maneuvered itself into a position where it has the power to subvert it. It is waiting for an opportunity. We might well be witnessing preparations for a coup--not a military coup, but a coup nevertheless. It could be only a matter of time before India will officially cease to be a secular, democratic republic." (833)
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