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[somerabbitholes]

Girl, are you a desi? And which subject are you graduating in? Just curious. I didn't see your bio anywhere.

helloo, yes i very much am desi. i graduated about two years ago with a master’s in history and now i work in policy research :))

an about me page is in the corner here

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Your blog is amazing. I think I have a crush on your blog.

oh my god stop

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Books you would recommend on this topic? Colonial, post colonial, and Cold War Asia are topics that really interest me. (Essentially all of the 1900s)

Hello! An entire century is huge and I don't quite know what exactly you're looking for, but here we are, with a few books I like. I've tried organising them, but so many of these things bleed into each other so it's a bit of a jumble

Cold War

1971 by Srinath Raghavan: about the Bangladesh Liberation War within the context of the Cold War, US-Soviet rivalry, and the US-China axis in South Asia

Cold War in South Asia by Paul McGarr: largely focuses on India and Pakistan, and how the Cold War aggravated this rivalry; also how the existing tension added to the Cold War; also the transition from British dominance to US-Soviet contest

Kennedy, Johnson, and the Nonaligned World by Robert B. Rakove: on the US' ties with the Nonaligned countries during decolonisation and in the early years of the Cold War; how US policy dealt with containment, other strategic choices etc

South Asia's Cold War by Rajesh Basrur: specifically about nuclear buildup, armament and the Indo-Pak rivalry within the larger context of the Cold War, arms race, and disarmament movements

Colonialism

India's War by Srinath Raghavan: about India's involvement in World War II and generally what the war meant for South Asia politically, economically and in terms of defense strategies

The Coolie's Great War by Radhika Singha: about coolie labour (non-combatant forces) in the first World War that was transported from India to battlefronts in Europe, Asia and Africa

Unruly Waters by Sunil Amrith: an environmental history of South Asia through British colonial attempts of organising the flow of rivers and the region's coastlines

Underground Revolutionaries by Tim Harper: about revolutionary freedom fighters in Asia and how they met, encountered and borrowed from each other

Imperial Connections by Thomas R. Metcalf: about how the British Empire in the Indian Ocean was mapped out and governed from the Indian peninsula

Decolonisation/Postcolonial Asia

Army and Nation by Steven Wilkinson: a comparative look at civilian-army relations in post-Independence India and Pakistan; it tries to excavate why Pakistan went the way it did with an overwhelmingly powerful Army and a coup-prone democracy while India didn't, even though they inherited basically the same military structure

Muslim Zion by Faisal Devji: a history of the idea of Pakistan and its bearing on the nation-building project in the country

The South Asian Century by Joya Chatterji: it's a huge book on 20th century South Asia; looks at how the subcontinental landmass became three/four separate countries, and what means for history and culture and the people on the landmass

India Against Itself by Sanjib Baruah: about insurgency and statebuilding in Assam and the erstwhile NEFA in India's Northeast. Also see his In the Name of the Nation.

I hope this helps!

[somerabbitholes]

isn't life about friendship?

Lorde ribs // Ross Gay catalog of unabashed gratitude // boygenius true blue // Anne Carson Euripides // Hanya Yanagihara a little life // unknown // @billypotts // Julie Baker hurt less // Trista mateer // Phoebe Bridgers Funeral // Hanya Yanagihara a little life // @slugspoon (Alivia Horsley) // Jean Little oranges // Sally Rooney beautiful world, where are you // unknown // Lorde world alone // boygenius we're in love // Margaret Atwood // Phoebe Bridgers punisher // Ryan O'connell the people you will fall in love with in your 20s // Lucy Dacus yours & mine // Arnold Label frog and toad are friends // Anne Carson Euripides // unknown // boygenius Leonard Cohen

[somerabbitholes]

Do you know sites from where I can download books for free? Zlib used to be free but not anymore.

Most of the books you read, I cannot find for free on internet. :') (I cannot afford to buy one from the market and no book shops nearby).

hi, i do, but i don't really want to share links like this after what happened with tiktok and z-lib. you can send me a message or write to me off anon, and i'd be happy to help :)

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i loved the sense of freefall in this book — it was persistent but never inevitable; and i loved loved loved the end

[somerabbitholes]

Hi! May i humbly suggest my study playlist: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/6TiiDFkRreNaeh8DEL7vCi?si=dX5hWbpbRri2x5ihekk_uw&pi=e-yrweaxxsTpe5

I especially recommend The Hare's Corner by Colm Mac Con Iomaire 🫶

!! thank you so much, this will sponsor today 💛

[somerabbitholes]

an accidentally mild coffee, reading about the cold war in south asia and listening to the new hozier ep

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hi, hit me with your best (or any, really) study playlists

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boygenius’ still the one cover. yeah.

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hey! i recently read the blind matriarch by namita gokhale and absolutely loved it. i wanna explore more indian authors, especially writings around families and households maybe. do you have some recommendations? do suggest some other too, regardless of whether they are around families/households.

thank you 💛

Hello! I haven't yet read The Blind Matriarch, but I think I know what kind of book it'll be. This is what I have/have liked on families and households:

Em and the Big Hoom by Jerry Pinto: about an East Indian family in Mumbai dealing with the mother's mental health; very touching and understated in how it moves

The Lives of Others by Neel Mukherjee: about a joint family in Kolkata and sort of through them about generational shifts in culture and wider politics; but also essentially about the family where everybody has something happening just under the surface; it's a book you can sink into

An Atlas of Impossible Longing by Anuradha Roy: this is a debut, which follows a large house in Songarh in British Bengal, and how lives intersect and interweave in that space; also follows the one family and its members through the years of Independence and just slightly after; the writing is just beautiful

For Indian fiction outside of this, you can see these lists here and here

[somerabbitholes]

Hello C🌻

I read Lonely City actually i savoured the book. Thank you so much recommending it. The book means a lot and it still leaves so much for us discover and understand about the artists in the book. Einaudi's Experience was playing when i was reading the last few pages and that made the end even more wonderful and tender.

I really think that you are single handedly promoting the book in India and are reason for sales here.

Thank you so much again for giving us all so much♥️🌻

C

I'm so glad you enjoyed it! Listening to it with Einaudi definitely sounds like a great listening experience.

I think I'm definitely due for a reread, once my copy comes back to me

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folks. i did not like poor things

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cut my hair to a length i will soon regret

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the more i think of it, the more i kinda see we don't have a lot of literary/misc/ others publications in Indian/Indian context, or maybe i'm just woefully unaware of them. I'm talking the likes of Aeon, BigThink, MITPress, The Nation etc. etc. do we have such publications available? Do you know of them?

you're right, we don't match in numbers at all, but i like to think they're growing. here's what i know: asian review of books, paper planes, the paperclip. other than these, i like the literary/culture sections in open, the hindu, scroll

always on the lookout for more, naturally

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btw archive dot org is SUCH a treasury when it comes to out-of-print poetry anthologies… i am having the time of my life, truly ❣️