Bombay, known for its Bollywood glamour, its diversity and the inevitable squalor that comes when square miles shelter a million people, will soon be the world’s most populous city. Writer and journalist Suketu Mehta’s Maximum City, a "tour de force… part memoir, part journalism, part travelogue" (The Times) is a remarkable account of this seething metropolis. Mehta was born in Calcutta, raised in Bombay and is now based in New York. He has been widely published and is currently working on an original screenplay for Merchant- Ivory. Maximum City, his first book and the product of seven years of research and writing, won the Kiriyama Prize and was shortlisted for both the Pulitzer Prize and the Samuel Johnson Prize for Non-Fiction. It is a dazzling and extraordinary work which extends its philosophical reach well beyond geographical borders. "[It] is more than a consideration of the material limits on urban living; it is a profound meditation on the existential (and even spiritual) longings that persist despite those limits." (New York Times Book Review)

 

 

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Sun 19 Mar, 2.45pm

Embassy Theatre

 

Concession Pass to 15 Writers Upfront sessions of your choice: $150 [FR $140]

 

16 Mar, 2:15pm