A love letter to traveling with friends
A review of ‘Roaming’ (Drawn and Quarterly, 2023) by Mariko Tamaki and Jillian Tamaki
1w ago
A graphic novel on the push and pull of friendships
The stories occur in places deeply etched into many of our memories—from rooftops to buses to benches in the park to the digital world of emails and texts.
1y ago
Lee Lai's 'Stone Fruit': Jokes, rhymes, and the depths of relationships
One of the most searing scenes in Lee Lai’s magnificent graphic novel, Stone Fruit (Fantagraphics, 2021) is when a young child, Nessie,
2y ago
Abdulrazak Gurnahs 'Afterlives': The repercussions of colonialism, unveiled
Abdulrazak Gurnah, this year’s Nobel laureate in literature, seems to come as an admirable choice compared to the Nobel Prize’s controversial recent history.
2y ago
Blood Brothers: exploring Ali and X’s bittersweet friendship
There are very few friendships that have attracted the public eye and provoked reactions of dread and rapacious approval in equanimity. One of those friendships - better described as blood brothers - is that of the charismatic militant civil rights activist, Malcolm X and the greatest boxer of all time, the ballistic and eye-brow raising trash talker, Muhammad Ali.
2y ago
Here’s why switching to ebooks is a good idea
Reading is popular. It has always been that way. Human beings have been reading ever since patterns of writing first emerged in cuneiform in Mesopotamia and books have always contained a kernel of our individual merriments.
2y ago
‘Wendy, Master of Art’: The life of the artist in graduate school
No one said earning a Masters in Fine Arts (MFA) would be easy. After all, art is anything but a linear process of creation. It zigzags through tumultuous periods of unease, delicate uncertainties, and perpetual anxieties, along with quite a mouthful of self-induced negativity.
2y ago
Essential skills for budding researchers
Many people are interested in research and it is not uncommon for young people, especially recent graduates, to join think tanks or research centres to try their luck at expanding the frontier of knowledge.
2y ago
September 24, 2020
Sketchy memories
Travis Dandro’s King of King Court: A Memoir (Drawn & Quarterly, 2019) is a large, dense book that reads light and fast. The coming of age story is packed with the raw emotional power of the author’s traumatic childhood.
September 18, 2020
Online interviews in the age of remote working
The lockdown following the global Covid-19 pandemic has shrunk the office space from a shared space saturated with buzzing colleagues to largely solitary confinement in a room with a laptop, pencil, notepad, and yes, the most important accessory, good internet connectivity.
September 8, 2020
Tips on trying different varieties of tea
With its origins going back as far as 5,000 years, green tea is commonly drunk in a serene emerald green tint.
September 1, 2020
Virtual Reality made easy
Since the onslaught of the coronavirus, many of us have been cooped up in our homes far away from the usual hustle and bustle of the concrete jungle.
August 27, 2020
Crimes that history cannot absolve
Korean literature has been enjoying a literary renaissance for quite some time through translation, from the likes of Hang Kang’s beguiling yet gruesome novel, The Vegetarian (2007) to Yeonmi Park’s heart wrenching memoir, In Order to Live (2015).
August 25, 2020
Reviving fondness of vogue through reading
As we spend more time whiling away our time on Netflix or any other streaming service during the quarantine period, we should also be acutely aware of the importance of self-care in our times of compulsory isolation.
August 14, 2020
Clash of the tech titans
Social media has also not been left untouched as proponents and distractors of social distancing battle it out. The world of technology likewise has its fair share of arguments with the latest battle-taking place between tech billionaires of Silicon Valley, Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg on the easing down of lockdowns.
August 11, 2020
The revolutionary history of the Swivel Chair
Be it in office boardrooms, workplaces or even our own bedrooms with our gadgets and computers/laptops, there is one common denominator we are bound to find in all three — the swivel chair, more commonly known as the revolving chair.
July 28, 2020
Relishing the delights of the Deli
The Gulshan Baking Company (GBC) had its inauguration on 18 December, 2019, when the Renaissance Dhaka Gulshan Hotel, a part of the esteemed Marriott International portfolio, made its grand debut in Bangladesh.
July 20, 2020
A good summer for fans of science biopics: Tesla and Curie headed our way
Two of the most thrilling biopics have knocked their way into our screens this summer: Tesla and Radioactive. One, which many would argue, is a testament to the afterlife resurgence of a reclusive and much-underappreciated scientist while the latter deals with a rich scientific legacy cemented on fighting the societal evils of sexism, xenophobia, and poverty.
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