PANAJI
The Margao-based Dogears bookshop discussion series 'What Next' will feature Dr Shashi Tharoor, who has authored 22 books, on December 12. Dr Tharoor will be in conversation with Vivek Menezes, writer, photographer, and co-founder and co-curator of the Goa Arts and Literature Festival (GALF). Dr Tharoor’s new book “ ‘The Battle of Belonging: On Nationalism, Patriotism, And What it Means to Be Indian’ will also be a part of the book discussion event.
After six unprecedented online sessions that have featured a range of popular writers from around India and their acclaimed new releases, the Dogears will be organising this live session. It is the latest unexpected, pandemic-times literary discussion highlight for a series that has also featured the acclaimed and award-winning authors Annie Zaidi, Jane Borges, Yogesh Maitreya, Parmesh Shahani, and Goa's own Jason Keith Fernandes. The previous session, with the eminent 89-year-old historian Dr Romila Thapar, was attended by audience members from Australia, the USA and UK, Portugal, Brazil apart from India.
Divided into six sections, Dr Tharoor’s book, ‘The Battle of Belonging’ starts off by exploring historical and contemporary ideas of nationalism, patriotism, liberalism, democracy, and humanism, many of which emerged in the West in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, and quickly spread throughout the world. The author then summarizes India’s liberal constitutionalism, exploring the enlightened values that towering leaders and thinkers like Gandhi, Nehru, Tagore, Ambedkar, Patel, Azad, and others invested the nation with.
This conversation, scheduled for December 12 at 7pm IST, will be held online over Airmeet. ‘What Next? The Identity Dialogues’ explores the ideas of identity and belonging as interpreted by various writers in their books. Those wishing to join this conversation can use this link: https://bit.ly/convwithST. A copy of the book can be purchased using this link: https://bit.ly/buyBoBbook or call Leonard Fernandes (9850398530).
