Arundhati Roy. The Cost of Living. 1999.

Two long essays: one about a large dam project in India, the other written to celebrate the occasion of India detonating an atomic bomb and becoming a nuclear power

My first full-length Roy and I am floored by the precision of her passion. This was also my first time reading about the politics of dam building, and I was duly freaked. It is also the first time in a long time that I have read something about the crimes of a terrible government that was not my own (save for a few KGB or Mossad autobiographies), although the U.S. is far from uncomplicit as she sees it

The second essay contained nothing I hadn’t already worked through when I was sixteen, living in a country with enough nuclear weapons to kill all life on earth multiple times, though she phrased it much better than I could have. This second essay felt like listening to rhetorical scream therapy. I couldn’t do much but wince in agreement.