The Checkbook and the Cruise Missile: Conversations with Arundhati Roy

by Arundhati Roy

A skillful interviewer can reveal aspects of a writer’s voice in simple yet telling ways. As a novelist, Arundhati Roy is known for her lush language and intricate structure. As a political essayist, her prose is searching and fierce. All of these qualities shine through in the interviews collected by David Barsamian for Globalizing Dissent: Converations with Arundhati Roy. New and devoted readers will find that these exchanges, recorded between 2001 and 2003, add to their appreciation of Roy’s previous work.Whether discussing her childhood or the problems of translation in a multilingual society, Roy and Barsamian, the producer and host of Alternative Radio, engage in a lively and accessible manner. Speaking candidly and casually, Roy describes her participation in a demonstration against the Indian dam program as, "absolutely fantastic." She jokes that her Supreme Court charge for "corrupting public morality"—in the case of her novel The God of Small Things—should have been changed to "further corrupting public morality." She calls on her training as an architect to explain what she means by the "physics of power." Like a house of cards, she argues that "unfettered power . . . cannot go berserk like this and expect to hold it all together."Roy has been acclaimed for her courage (Salman Rushdie) and her eloquence (Kirkus Reviews), and her writing has been described as "a banquet for the senses" (Newsweek). She has found a readership among fiction enthusiasts and political activists. Globalizing Dissent captures Roy speaking one-on-one to her audience, revealing her intense and wide-ranging intellect, her very personal voice, and her opinion on momentous political events.Arundhati Roy’s novel The God of Small Things was awarded the Booker Prize in 1997. She is the recipient of the 2002 Lannan Foundation Prize for Cultural Freedom.

Genres: Nonfiction, Politics, India

178 pages, Paperback

First published February 1, 2003

About the author

Arundhati Roy is an Indian writer who is also an activist who focuses on issues related to social justice and economic inequality. She won the Booker Prize in 1997 for her novel, The God of Small Things, and has also written two screenplays and several collections of essays.

For her work as an activist she received the Cultural Freedom Prize awarded by the Lannan Foundation in 2002.

Reviews

[Alexander · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is what the kids call a vibe-check kinda book. You learn less about the issues discussed (this is a book of interviews) than an approach to them, an orientation: to stand against power; to recognize the idiosyncrasies of 'the West'; to celebrate the dignity of independence; to see the interconnectedness of things. A set of discussions nearly twenty years old, Roy is here, politically, where it took me thirty years to get to. This is a kindred spirit, musing over the brutalities of the world in as lighthearted a fashion as one probably can. The above average rating isn't because this isn't good, it's just more because of the limitations of the interview format: it ranges wide, but cuts only just-so.

[Archer Wright · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have just recently begun learning about the rise of Indian Hindu nationalism, led mainly by the BJP and RSS. These discussions with Roy give a good analysis of both the resistance and the support for Modi and his policies, while not becoming too "in the weeds" of Indian politics

[Barak · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was highly impressed by the interviews of Arundhati Roy, whose answers are always thought-provoking, honest (if one-sided), eloquent and erudite in nature.

At the same time, like any activist of any side, she tends to be one-sided, and rarely gives you the full view and events leading to a particular situation, so in that respect not as honest as she might have been otherwise.

It seems people with strong and opposite moral principals can rarely engage in a meaningful discourse since their passion for what they believe is right can easily get in the way of the facts and/or rational discussion.

Having said that I am quite interested at some point to read her essays that are captured in her book The Algebra of Infinite Justice. Seems I have marked it as "owned" - if only I knew on what shelf it is...

[N Patel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Reading with a book that's actually transcribed interviews was my way of trying to get back into some academic reading. This book was mostly a history lesson for me since the interviews were conducted between 1999 and 2002 and I don't know that much about Indian politics but it was interesting to think about how much has changed but also how much is the same. Also at one point she makes a prediction about the media in the US potentially changing to that US citizens/residents are aware of exactly how much violence the state commits globally which was interesting to think about since I'm not really sure that's happened yet (20 years later).

In general I really like Roy and while some of the rhetoric she uses feels outdated, her ideas about what democracy is and how to think about organized resistance against states are still relevant.

[Desca Ang · Rating 4 out of 5]

"There are many happiness that come from just loving and companionship and even losing."
-The Chequebook and the Cruise Missile:Conversation with Arundhati Roy
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Full review: https://literatureisliving.wordpress....
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[Sophia · Rating 3 out of 5]

An interesting collection of essays. I really enjoy Roy's voice and am excited to pick up some of her fiction. While these essays were written in a different time, the early 2000s, many of the ideas still feel relevant. Her discussions of Hindutva were alarmingly prescient, especially as she discusses Modi when he was a governor. This provided a lot of helpful background. Roy is so intelligent and I found myself writing down countless quotes from this slim volume.

[Sri · Rating 4 out of 5]

The clarity and consistency this woman has with her ideas and words is unmatched. No one captures and distills the recognizable shape of power, across a broad variety of complex issues, quite the way she does. I will be reading more of her formal work soon.

[Nicholas Morley · Rating 3 out of 5]

An excellent overview of Roy's sociopolitical worldview. The interviews wrap you in the warmth of a revolutionary woman in the midst of an India taking a turn for the fascist.

[Oz · Rating 4 out of 5]

A little simplistic, but a great introduction to Roy’s work. Hopefully it inspires readers to check out the other texts mentioned within. I’m glad I read this before checking out The God of Small Things, it provides some important context.

[Aliya · Rating 5 out of 5]

To say that Arundhati Roy is brilliant, is an understatement. She marries intellect with pithy eloquence, saying so much in a few words.

It looks like Ms Roy has an opinion on everything: dams in India; corporate takeover of state responsibilities in India; sectarian politics in India; Bush and his wars in Asia; and the politics of division in India, be they of religion or caste or language. However, there is only one subject Ms. Roy pursues in the various issues she discusses, namely the politics of power.

I always enjoy her writings, even though they aren't exactly educational for me. However, it is extremely heartening to know that there is a voice such as hers in India, that unabashedly speaks the truth, without any agenda. Since it is the truth she speaks, often, her words remind me of a Qur'anic verse or hadith, and I smile as I nod my head, appreciating how spot on she is!

[Bruce Cline · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Checkbook and the Cruise Missile, conversations with Arundhati Roy, interviews by David Barsamiam (pp 157). Roy is an Indian social commentator, journalist, and author. This book is a series of interviews of her thoughts about India, America, and the world. Rather than make what would be a pathetic attempt to summarize these wide-ranging conversations, I will quote several illustrative passages:

... all over the world, freedoms are being snatched away at a frightening pace. I think it’s not just important but urgent for us to become extremely troublesome citizens...

... we have to rescue democracy by being troublesome, by asking questions, by making a noise.

Every person who gets ahead gets ahead by stepping on his brother, or sister, or mother, or friend.

[Tina Shull · Rating 4 out of 5]

I think one of the most important points in this book that I came away with was Roy's assertion that the 'farther away' decision making takes place in a community or a country (i.e. on a higher bureaucratic level), the more dehumanized the process becomes - leading to the neglect of the people the decisions directly affect. This was in regard to the movement to build dams in India, but it really hit home for me and can apply universally...

[Kerre · Rating 3 out of 5]

Arundhati Roy is a really amazing writer and organizer. She is among a few outspoken writers that i feel presents both a well researched, thoughtful and not entirely hopeless view of our history and our current world. This interview doesn't really do that though, not sure if she just doesn't or is never given the chance, but she just skims the surface of most political issues. Not the best collection of her work.

[Hanisha Vaswani · Rating 5 out of 5]

A book that will make you question all you see, hear, and think: your beliefs, the pre-digested rot you are fed by most media, ideas you've inculcated from your environment, your teachers, everything!

Doubly deadly if you're Indian.

[Alan]

One of my favorite quotes:

“But still, how are you going to persuade a Naga sadhu–whose life mission has been to stand naked on one leg for twenty years or to tow a car with his penis–that he can’t live without Coca-Cola?” --page 17

[Minku · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is an interview-style book, with David Barsamian (who interviews everybody), and A-Roy tells it like it is about India, America, and the rest of the fucked-up world we live in.