Table of Contents
Foreword xiii;
The End of Imagination 1;
The Greater Common Good 25;
Power Politics: The Reincarnation of Rumpelstiltskin 76;
The Ladies Have Feelings, So … Shall We Leave It to the Experts? 106;
The Algebra of Infinite Justice 126;
War Is Peace 138;
On Citizens' Rights to Express Dissent 150;
Democracy: Who Is She When She's at Home? 160;
War Talk: Summer Games with Nuclear Bombs 177;
Ahimsa (Nonviolent Resistance) 182;
Come September 187;
The Loneliness of Noam Chomsky 206;
Confronting Empire 221;
Peace Is War: The Collateral Damage of Breaking News 227;
An Ordinary Person's Guide to Empire 242;
Instant-Mix Imperial Democracy (Buy One, Get One Free) 254;
When the Saints Go Marching Out: The Strange Fate of Martin, Mohandas, and Mandela 273;
In Memory of Shankar Guha Niyogi 280;
Do Turkeys Enjoy Thanksgiving? 284;
How Deep Shall We Dig? 293;
The Road to Harsud 309;
Public Power in the Age of Empire 329;
Peace and the New Corporate Liberation Theology 355;
Breaking the News 363;
"And His Life Should Become Extinct": The Very Strange Story of the Attack on the Indian Parliament 375;
Custodial Confessions, the Media, and the Law 404;
Listening to Grasshoppers: Genocide, Denial, and Celebration 408;
Azadi 433;
Nine Is Not Eleven (and November Isn't September) 447;
Democracy's Failing Light 463;
Mr. Chidambaram's War 489;
The President Took the Salute 507;
Walking with the Comrades 511;
Trickledown Revolution 569;
Kashmir's Fruits of Discord 606;
I'd Rather Not Be Anna 612;
Speech to the People's University 618;
Capitalism: A Ghost Story 621;
A Perfect Day for Democracy 654;
The Consequences of Hanging Afzal Guru 660;
The Doctor and the Saint: The Ambedkar-Gandhi Debate 668;
Professor, P.O.W. 787;
My Seditious Heart 795;
Appendix;
The Great Indian Rape-Trick I 836;
The Great Indian Rape-Trick II 849;
Acknowledgments 861;
Glossary 863;
Notes 870;
Index 957

"In constant conversation with the themes and settings of her novels, the essays form a near-unbroken memoir of Arundhati Roy's journey as both a writer and a citizen, of both India and the world, from "The End of Imagination", which begins this book, to 'Azadi', with which it ends. Bookended by her two award-winning novels, The God of Small Things (1997) and The Ministry of Utmost Happiness (2017), My Seditious Heart collects the work of a two-decade period when Arundhati Roy devoted herself to the political essay as a way of opening up space for justice, rights, and freedoms in an increasingly hostile world. Taken together, the essays speak in a voice of unique spirit, marked by compassion, clarity, and courage. Radical and superbly readable, they speak always in defense of the collective, of the individual and of the land, in the face of the destructive logic of financial, social, religious, military, and governmental elites"-- Provided by publisher.