Sarmishta Subramanian

A few months ago, a colleague of mine and I had a curious exchange with a writer whose work we wanted to publish in the Literary Review of Canada. The writer declined the opportunity, citing as his reason an article we had run that he said contributed to violence against women. I was taken…

Among my more vivid memories of my nerdish preteen years in the city then called Madras is of reading Oscar Wilde plays aloud with my mother. We read under fluorescent tube light in a house surrounded on three sides by sand and the Bay of Bengal, from a hardbound volume that now sits on her bookcase in…

Readers with a penchant for publishing-industry trivia may recall a story from 20 years ago, about an enterprising Canadian author, Sandra Gulland. The author of a trilogy of best-selling books about Josephine Bonaparte, Gulland hit upon an ingenious scheme to ensure her sophomore novel disappointed as few of her readers as possible: she focus-grouped the manuscript with an audience committed to close reading (and book buying): book…

For anyone who has lost track amid all the twists and turns, just about a week ago the scandal that began with an editorial calling for a cultural appropriation prize was not so much as a twitch in anyone’s eye. In seven days, we have seen fundraising for the imaginary prize by some of the country’s top…