With the Nobel Prizes Facing Mounting Criticism, Do They Still Remain Relevant In An Era of Global Research?
Every October, a handful of scientists get woken up by a phone call to find out they have won a Nobel Prize in physiology or medicine, physics or chemistry. Startled and bleary-eyed, they throw a shirt on over their pyjamas, join a video call to Stockholm and try to explain
Nobel Prize in Literature 2024: Han Kang Becomes First South Korean Author to Win Coveted Honour
The Nobel Prize in Literature was awarded to South Korean author Han Kang (53) on October 10, for what the Nobel committee called “her intense poetic prose that confronts historical traumas and exposes the fragility of human life”. Mats Malm, permanent secretary of the Swedish Academy’s Nobel Committee, announced the
O.P. Sharma Photography: Pioneering Indian Pictorialist’s Artistic Vision and Legacy | Retrospective Exhibition 1950s-1990s
The first thing you saw at the retrospective titled “O.P. Sharma & the Fine Art of Photography: 1950s-1990s” (September 5 to October 3)—organised by the Alkazi Foundation for the Arts in collaboration with Art Heritage, at Shridharani Gallery, Triveni Kala Sangam, New Delhi—was not a photograph. It was a watercolour,
“Bhakti Is A Matter of Fire and Blood’: Jerry Pinto on Translating Bhakti Poetry, Its Challenges, Rewards, and Cultural Bridges
It is hard to find a form of writing that Jerry Pinto does not revel in. He started as a poet. His 2006 biography of the Bollywood dancing star Helen (Helen: The Life and Times of A Bollywood H-Bomb) changed that. These light-hearted literary avatars were pushed aside by the tender
Nobel Laureate Han Kang Declines Celebration Amid Wars in Ukraine and Gaza
Awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature for her craft, the South Korean writer Han Kang was immediately faced with her sense of political responsibility. A writer is not an isolated being lost in the island of literature. She is a political being who lives in the midst of the world
Baba, Bollywood, Bishnoi and Brand Mumbai: How a Politician’s Murder Shook Mumbai’s Power Corridors
In this photograph taken in July 2013, then Congress leader Baba Siddique is flanked by actors Salman Khan and Shah Rukh Khan at an Iftar party in Mumbai. | Photo Credit: PTI This story has all the elements of a crime thriller. Former Maharashtra minister Baba Siddique (66) was killed
Ranjit Hoskote’s Translation of Mir Taqi Mir: An Attempt of Failure
Mir Taqi Mir in 1786. | Photo Credit: Wiki Commons Let me admit that I am a votary of the following falsifiable proposition that is almost a cliché among those who follow Urdu poetry: A great poet creates a new idiom for the language. This proposition yields the following corollary
Baburao Bagul’s ‘Lootaloot’: A Deep Dive into the Struggles of the Oppressed in Mumbai
In the titular story of Baburao Bagul’s classic short story collection Maran Swasta Hot Aahe (Death is Becoming Cheap)—published in Marathi in 1969 and now available in translation as Lootaloot—a poet and short story writer walks through the city in search of a muse but finds, instead, sordid stories of the dispossessed. “This
The Flood of Mediocrity: Examining Art’s Value in the Digital Age
Not too long ago, one of the more common refrains from adults was that things were much better when they were growing up. However intolerant, churlish, and prejudiced that sounded, there was some truth to it, at least in the quality of our cultural and artistic life. Today an unmitigated
How Watching Films Influences Perceptions and Emotions: The Impact of Cinema in Society
Watching a documentary film about a wrongly incercerated man caused participants in a study to be more supportive of reforms to the US criminal justice system. | Photo Credit: STRF/STAR MAX/IPx/picture alliance Storytelling is about changing minds. Film is no different: since the first moving pictures in the 1890s, filmmakers