We, The Heartbroken

by Gargi Bhattacharyya

What do we do when the world breaks our hearts? Racial capitalism in the age of pandemic continues to crush ever more lives and spirits. Yet, we are told repeatedly to master, to overcome, to be resilient. Beneath this fragile pretence of coping, many of us have grown used to living with profound and fathomless sorrow.


In graceful prose, Gargi Bhattacharyya navigates collective grief and how it mingles with personal tragedy. Alongside love and joy, perhaps grief is what makes us human―and while its pain scrapes our wounds, its presence can help us renounce that which exists and build anew.


Heartbreak is the class consciousness of our times. So, it is up to us, the heartbroken, to learn again to heal—and remake the world.


Gargi Bhattacharyya lives and works in London. Their work includes writing on racism, racial capitalism, austerity and war.

Genres: Essays, Nonfiction

117 pages, Paperback

First published March 30, 2023

About the author

Gargi Bhattacharyya is a Professor of Sociology at the University of East London. They have written widely in the fields of racism, sexuality, global cultures and the ‘war on terror’.

Reviews

[Claire · Rating 4 out of 5]

A playlist, intro & outro and short intellectual musings on grief, (collective and individual) as Heartbrokenness.
Or Heartbrokenness period.

Structured under the familiar + headings or launch pads of Shock, Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression, Testing and Acceptance.

Not a book about 'grief', a book about how the experience and anticipation of grief sit within and alongside a registering of collective sorrow, how there can be no remaking of the world without ways to allow for our collective sorrow.

"We are the broken-hearted not only because of loss, but also because of knowledge. Not only because life ends, but because life disappoints. And, most of all, not only because into each life some rain must fall, but also because the deluge washing away the possibilities of human life sweeps down generations, reducing us all "

[huda 💋 · Rating 3 out of 5]

3,5 ⭐️

beautifully written book about grief and heartbrokeness by political defeat - the essays and prose are beautifully written and i finished this book
in three sessions (which is rare cause i get distracted easily) butttttt at times it feels a bit superficial - and the last chapter on solidarity where they defined solidarity as blurring the boundaries between the me and you - got me thinking i’m not sure if i agree

all hajar press books slap tho what a great publishing house !!!!! 💋💋💋💋

[Z · Rating 4 out of 5]

One of the best leftist thinkers of our generation gets into their feelings. It's so beautiful. Hope Gargi writes a novel soon

[Debs Erwin · Rating 4 out of 5]

A beautiful, powerful and thought-provoking treatise on grief both personal and collective within the wider context of social injustices - one I'd like to return to and ponder some more.

[Christian Gurdin · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this in a couple of hours with unswerving attention & interest. It’s written in the most beautiful prose and, although it is outside of my usual area of interest, I read this because of Gargi’s brilliant theoretical-political-historical writings.

However, I was not disappointed. This was truly mesmerising at times, explaining things i’ve felt, but never been able to put into words. The only reason i’ll give this a 4 and not a 5 is because I wish that the text went further into the heartbreak that emerges after “political defeat” (for want of a better phrase), although I’m being slightly harsh as I don’t think this was her intention.

I think this book has provided me with an entirely new perspective on how to “deal” (even though Battacharyya specifically warns against this kind of language/discourse, rather, I should say “live with”…) with grief, sorrow and heartbreak. I am thankful this book fell on my lap at the time it did.

“Heartbreak is at the heart of all revolutionary consciousness. How can it not be? Who can imagine another world unless they already have been broken apart by the world we are in? […] it is only we, the heartbroken, who can truly battle and long for a world where no-one ever feels like this again."

[jq · Rating 3 out of 5]

thank you so much hajar press as usual for always publishing such interesting and insightful books!

i enjoyed the thesis and ideas behind this, as well as the structure!, but i felt it could have been developed in a more solid manner. the memoir parts of this, that are anchored in specific memories and stories and threads, are the strongest and most compelling. but a lot of this feels like a first draft, the author rambling to themself (while claiming to be speaking to the 'you' of the reader) and figuring things out as they go along. while there's nothing wrong with some meandering, i felt that these moments could have been revised a bit to make them more poignant and do more work for the book as a whole.

finally, i wonder whether solidarity should be defined as a moment when the 'i' falls away completely and all difference is erased/subsumed for a larger 'we'. i wonder whether solidarity would be more usefully understood as a recognition of difference and conflict. although i understand that the porousness of our bodies in heartbreak + the feeling that "i can't remember me" is orgasmic and radically beautiful, i wonder whether this is necessarily what the definition of solidarity is. and all this is just the last few paragraphs of the whole book, with the author refusing to elaborate on what they mean by that and why they believe it... which is a bit disappointing. i would have wanted to hear more about this, perhaps through tangible examples.

but this follows the pattern of the book as a whole - every time it gets really intriguing, the author runs away instead of wrestling with the opacity of the topics they're discussing.

[Gusti · Rating 3 out of 5]

i was expecting to be shaken and bawled and to feel raw emotion, but i have to confess I have difficulties to feel such feelings -- maybe because I haven't really bared myself to grief, or to grieve intensely. someday, when i experience that, i promise to myself i'll read this book once again.

but I like the way Gargi, such a feminist Marxist they are, contextualised the intensity, embodiment of, and reflective power of grief with collective imagination, with class solidarity and consciousness, with racial capitalism. some important notes I quote:

"The capacity to grieve opens us to the possibility of imagining collective and diverse pains and, through that, also to comprehend something of the immense diverse and variegated violences that waste our joys and our potentials."

"... heartbrokennes is the class consciousness of racial capitalism. class consciousness only deserves the name if it goes towards the formation of class agents, even in embryonic form, even when messily intertwined with ways of feeling that are still far from anything we might recognise as 'agency'."

to honour Gargi, the last chapter and the outro were very powerful. tho I only give three stars, I'll recommend this to everyone!

[Jill Eastland · Rating 3 out of 5]

I loved the theme of this book and recognised the collective grief we experience for humanity aa activists, but I wanted to learn more about this.

[Vidz · Rating 4 out of 5]

there were parts that were beautiful but it didnt hold me as much as i thought it would

[Hinnd · Rating 5 out of 5]

Whenever I need healing, and I do, I read this book. See you on https://apps.apple.com/gb/app/upscrol...

[smellerbee · Rating 5 out of 5]

as a griever and a comrade, i wish all of my friends would read this book. it is a great epic on heartbreak, collective grief, and racial capitalism.

politically, it feels like a very foundational and important work for anyone to read.

personally, it touched on topics and stories so directly connected with my own experience i was stunned.