In 1975, when political scientist Benedict Anderson reached Wat Phai Rong Wua, a massive temple complex in rural Thailand conceived by Buddhist monk Luang Phor Khom, he felt he had wandered into a dem
Yves Bonnefoy is one of the greatest living voices of contemporary French poetry. In this, his sixth book published by Seagull Books, he explores in profound new ways the mysteries of human consciousn
Laura Wilmote is a television journalist living in Paris. Her life couldn’t be better—a stimulating job, a loving boyfriend, interesting friends—until her phone rings in the middle of one night. It is
First published in Italian in 1968, The World Saved by Kids was written in the aftermath of deep personal change and in the context of what Elsa Morante called the “great youth movement exploding agai
Originally published in Italian in 1965, A Test of Powers was immediately seen as one of the central texts of Italian intellectual life. By the time of the 1968 student revolts, it was clear that Fran
The ten plays in this collection offer unprecedented grassroots perspectives on the jubilation, terror, hope, and heartbreak of mass uprising as seen during and in the wake of the Tahrir Square demons
Theater in New Zealand began as a tool of the British Empire, imported along with Christianity, seeds, and other commodities as a way of acculturating the indigenous Maori population. In the decades s
Lutz Seiler grew up in the former East Germany and has lived most of his life outside Berlin. His poems, not surprisingly, are works of the border, the in-between, and the provincial, marked by whispe
One of the central figures from a remarkable generation of French-language poets, Pierre Chappuis has thus far only been represented in English translation in fragments: a few poems here and there in
In 2010, Robert Menasse journeyed to Brussels to begin work on a novel centered on the European Union. His extended stay resulted in a completely different book—Enraged Citizens, European Peace and De
In this novel by the 2012 Nobel Laureate in Literature, Mo Yan, a benign old monk listens to a prospective novice’s tale of depravity, violence, and carnivorous excess while a nice little family drama
One night in the middle of winter, as deep snow covers the mountains and forests, a doctor is crossing the ridge in Austria from Traich to Föding to see a patient. He stumbles over a body in the
As recent films like Slumdog Millionaire attest, India on film is quickly growing beyond the images of Bollywood that used to come to mind. In the 1980s the idea of film theory arrived in the Indian
In this volume of sixteen essays, D. R. Nagaraj, the foremost non-Brahmin intellectual to emerge from India’s non-English-speaking world, presents his vision of the Indian caste system in relation to
Remembered Rhythms explores the role of music and cultural memory in shaping and creating diasporic identities. With contributions from leading scholars in the fields of ethnomusicology, cultural stud
Tzvetan Todorov explores the complex relations between art, politics and ethics in the two essays that make up The Limits of Art. In the first essay, `Artists and Dictators', he traces the intimate re
In 1965 Indonesia had the largest communist movement in the world outside of the Soviet Union and the People's Republic of China. Indonesian President Sukarno supported the movement and was edging Ind
The essays collected in Incidents, originally published in French shortly after Barthes' death, provide unique insight into the author's life, his personal struggles and his delights. Though Barthes q
In First Light, novelist Ralf Rothmann paints a delicate portrait of a twelve-year-old boy named Julian growing up in a mining community in 1960s Germany. The book covers only a few summer weeks, f
Jurek Becker (1937–97) is best known for his novel Jacob the Liar, which follows the life of a man, who, like Becker, lived in the Lodz ghetto during the German occupation of Poland in World War II. T
Brahmins named Iftikar, Buddhist rites in Hindu Shiva temples, Indian maidens dressed like Arabian harem girls - right from the birth of cinema, international movies have been wildly inventive in thei
In Rebels, Wives, Saints, acclaimed scholar Tanika Sarkar continues her revolutionary scholarship on women, religion, and nationhood in colonial Bengal. The colonial universe Sarkar describes in Rebel
Indian nationalists have a great project in hand. Their work-in-progress is the recovery of India's proud past and it's rightful place at the centre of human civilization. In pursuit of this, history
Part of an ongoing series published in cooperation with the Index on Censorship that deals with religion and free expression, The Jewish Case is distinctive in several ways. To begin with, even callin
In the aftermath of 9/11, the United States government came to apply a practice outlawed in Europe in the eighteenth century and prohibited by the Geneva Conventions and by the United Nations Conventi
After Independence, in 1947, in their efforts to create an "Indian" theatre that was different from the Westernized, colonial theatre, Indian theatre practitioners began returning to their &
Situations III, published in English for the first time in the form that Sartre himself gave to the collection, contains essays from the philosopher's most creative period, 1945-49. The first section,
In the autumn of 1924, two young men met in Paris for the first time. Georges Bataille was just 27 and had recently started working at the Bibliothèque nationale. Michel Leiris, 23, was beginnin
The relationship between cinema and modernity in the Indian context is both complex and multifaceted. In this volume, some of the leading names in film and cultural studies explore its many dimensions
Nations need identities. These are created from perceptions of how societies have evolved. In this, history plays a central role. Insisting on reliable history is therefore crucial to more than just a
In The Glance of the Medusa, Lászó F. Földényi offers a mesmerizing examination of the rich history of European culture through the lens of mythology and philosophy. Embracin
In Everything: And Other Performance Texts from Germany, Matt Cornish gathers texts drawn from performances by five of the most renowned theater collectives working today: andcompany&Co., Gob Squa
Over the past three decades, theater studies has undergone a radical worldwide development and renewal. This happened through two different yet complementary paths: the first (North American in origin
Dangerous Outcast traces prostitution in Bengal from precolonial times through the arrival of the British, examining how the profession was reordered to suit British desires. Drawing on nineteenth-cen
Northern Spain is the only part of Western Europe where anarchism played a significant role in political life of the twentieth century. Enjoying wide-ranging support among both the urban and rural wor
Like stars in the sky, pixels may seem like tiny, individual points. But, when viewed from a distance, they can create elaborate images. Each pixel contributes to this array, but no individual point c
Stella Vinitchi Radulescu’s poetry dwells in spaces of paradox, seeking out the words, metaphors, and images that capture both the peaceful stillness of snow and the desperate cry of human exper
Norway. The 1800s. Endre must to take over the family farm from his father—his father, who swings the sickle and sharpens the scythe, and says this is the only way in which rocks and stones and
Somewhere deep in the European forest they meet. Frontier workers, smugglers, refugees, workers, asylum seekers, inspectors, artists, musicians, actors, journalists, scholarship holders, logisticians,
“Not writing is always a relief and sometimes a pleasure. Writing about what cannot be written, by contrast, is the devil’s own job.”In this unusual text, a blend of essay, fiction,
