Again and again Roy asks powerful, paradigmatic questions: "Can we leave the bauxite in the mountain?" "How deep shall we dig?" She reminds us of this shared summit, this sacred peak worthy of endless struggle and ultimate sacrifice: human dignity—timeless, sacrosanct, and unmuddied by the idols of extraction/empire or corporate-nationalism. She quotes Dr. King who named the "triple, interrelated evils" of empire—racism, economic exploitation, and the problem of war—and demonstrates in case after case the continued relevance of his assessment.

A few notes/essential reminders/lessons from this text, which to me feels really more like a manual to revisit and a guide to thinking through what it means to live in Empire:

1. That crisis reportage polarizes, unmoors and isolates individual events from their complex history, and diverts our attention from the real crises of quiet dispossession, the creeping violation of dignity, and the "unrelenting daily grind of injustice" that, in addition to causing astronomical harm, slowly and endlessly distance oppressed and oppressor further and further from one another as "neo-liberalism drives its wedge between the rich and the poor" worldwide.

2. That for most people in our world, peace is war. How easily and how often do we forget? That structural violences (institutionalized inequities) create an "endless crisis of normality." Importantly, we must "lose our terror of the mundane." We must focus on the ordinary, the everyday: on food, water, shelter, dignity, and "the policies and processes that make [them]...such a distant dream for ordinary people."

3. That Empire is inherently paranoid, filled with a kind of nervous insecurity that stems from a covering-of-the-Truth and spills over into endless acts of paranoid aggression. That its obsession with defense (offense) stems from its unending (deserved) terror, its ultimate exposure, its artificially wrought sense of safety: what Roy calls the "soft underbelly" of an Empire whose "economic outposts are," of course, "exposed and vulnerable." What does true safety look like, and where is it rooted? Another indirect but crucial question that echoes through the text.

Often Roy's questions sat heavy on this reader's chest—especially now, reading her in this global moment. How can one possibly live in Empire and do no harm—let alone start to right its mindbending wrongs? But in oases of clarity I felt heartened by the text's call to grounded action, to attention and prayerful devotion to the ordinary, to rivers and clinics and schools and farms. Oh, may we see things as they are; may we Remember when we forget; may we rise gracefully to the challenge of this discernment; may we serve body and soul, body and soul; may we be forgiven as we carry on in the heart of empire.

If there is one book I have made a good decision in reading, it was this. I would recommend this book for anyone who knows how to read. A collection of Arundhati Roy's speeches, essays and articles from the years 2002-2004, it struck me painfully how relevant the contents of her writings still are in 2019. The crux of the book revolves around her formulating an understanding of the global American "Empire" in the aftermath of the Iraq invasion and how corporate globalisation and a right-wing Hindu fascist government in India is doing more harm than good. Almost twenty years later, with the present-day news unfolding more horrendous moves by the government, I can only wince every time Roy closes out with an optimistic outlook.
What with the highest number of Internet blackouts and curfews imposed for peaceful protests in any democratic country in 2019, India hasn't made much progress in terms of human rights in the last 20 years it seems. The man who was responsible for a state-sponsored massacre of Muslims in Gujarat is today the Prime Minister of the country. Assam and the rest of the North-Eastern states are worse off than ever, the rights of Dalits, Adivasis and indigenous populations continue to be threatened with the looming CAA-NRC, and finally, India has become a colonial state thanks to its forceful occupation of Kashmir. None of the scenarios Roy has mentioned have a happy ending. Moreover, it fills me with dread on the realisation that if her warnings went unheard twenty years back, what guarantee do we have that the BJP won't be back someday with a vengeance (if we do manage to root them out this time)?
If anything, I would want people to engage with texts like this more than ever. If we are to at all live up to the ideals of the Constitution, if we are to see any semblance of peace and progression from our violence-ridden politics, we need to see our political parties for what they are, move past their divisive politics and call for a systemic change. If we have been stuck in a time loop for the last twenty years and can't seem to make any progress, it is because we allow ourselves to be embroiled in petty communal hatred. Roy says our brightest hope is in mass resistance. I agree.
There are so many gems in this book, it was hard for me to pick them. It gets a gold star. Please read.

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Interesting to read these essays nearly twenty years later. Many changes for the better and worse in my opinion.Nationalism has been on rise across the globe with much sabre rattling but without American troops on the ground.
Corporations have conquered the world and have become more powerful than countries. People have become barcodes to be brainwashed and marketed to.
China is fast approaching American as the new Colonial superpower flexing its muscles and the party consolidating its position whilst presenting itself as a more efficient model than true democracy.
The game changer has been the pandemic which has shown the world up in its true colours and hopefully changed it forever.
It has ousted the worst president in history who was fast creating a fascist state. It has exposed the hidden racism across across the west. It has exposed the Hindu extremism of Modi’s India and its rural poverty
Wars and hatred still ravage the Mid East. Russia is still ruled by tzar Putin who poisons those who stand up to him.
Th globe has taken a gulp of fresh air due to the lockdowns and there is a new spirt and and desire to tackle carbon emissions but is it too late. That is the biggest question facing mankind today.
The world has moved on but is it any better?

To describe this book in two words.. Powerful work. Arundhati Roy's writing style is so sharp and compelling that, at times it'll make your blood boil reading about the atrocities perpetrated by governments and corporations against the powerless and economically-weaker sections of the society. In this book, Ms. Roy tackles the issue of destruction of innocent lives wrought by neoliberalism, neoimperialism and corporate globalization. How it has become a daily battle for the poor man to obtain the very basic necessities of a simple life -- water, food, a home and some semblance of dignity -- while the vultures called corporations plunder away the resources of the people. And Roy backs all her statements with facts from credible sources.

A must read for anybody having a little empathy for the suffering of common people due to the greed of a few powerful evil men, across the world. Highly recommended.

A short book of essays and talks from the early 2000s, recent post-9/11 and the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq by the US and its coalition of the willing, so perhaps a bit dated. Still, the fundamental injustices of that time are certainly still with us today. These are classic Arundhati Roy political essays, expertly calling out the oppressive machinery of globalization and neo-liberalism , and rightfully slamming US and Indian "democracies" and the "free" press. My favorite was "Instant-mix Imperial Democracy." Four stars because the essays were a bit repetitive and a bit more variety would have been good.

وبسرعة هائلة اصبح في المفضلة. الكتابة جائت من الخيال
'Television tells us that Iraq has been 'liberated' and that Afganistan is well on its way to becoming a paradise for women-thanks to bush and blair, the twenty-first century's leading feminists'

Strong ideas. A bit repetitive. More of a 3.5. Important book though

Made some good points in the beginning and then became rambly and whiny. She needed to introduce some new points.

Arundhati Roy makes me feel less insane. This is a collection of speeches and essays from the second Bush administration at the height of Iraq War/War on Terror mania and it has been simultaneously activating and a balm to return for another few pages every couple weeks during the imperialistic madness of this past year.

When I got assigned this book for a grad school class, I was kind of excited. I read some of Roy's stuff when I was an undergrad (10+ years ago) and like it. If I had read this book back then, I probably would have ranked it 4 or 5 stars. She brought up a lot of good points, like the media influencing people's ideas and the connection between the Bush family and the sketchy war in Iraq.

The problem with this book is twofold... One, this stuff is well known now and, unfortunately, wasn't acted upon... which kind of discredits Roy's opinions (even though I think she was right about most of these things). Second, in this work, she is very fast and loose with facts and her style is somewhat unprofessional... which kind of discredits her facts.

Sorry, Roy, I like you and I agree with your ideas... but you didn't completely win me over here.

arundhati roy rocks out. let's be honest. this book is a collected of mostly speeches she has made. and while she tackles subjects that aren't particularly original, she attacks them in such a way that i was like yeah. yeah! that's right. i guess i mean, she writes in this very empowering way. i've been having little attention span with real extensive pieces lately, but i really got into these.

some random quotations i particularly liked:

"stokley carmicheal described the draft as "white people sending black people to make war on yellow people in order to defend land they stole from red people"

and

"debating imperialism is a bit like debating the pros and cons of rape. what can we say?
that we really miss it?"

brilliant.

This is a collection of speeches and essays from 2002-2003 but it's horrifying how relevant it is today. Should be in essential reading lists of all college courses and essential reading lists for life in the 21st century tbh.