LitRadar - May 3, 2026 - The Act of Killing

This article examines the unsettling intersection of history, memory, and cinematic representation through The Act of Killing, a documentary by Joshua Oppenheimer. It begins by recalling a 1966 column by James Reston, who framed Indonesia’s violent anti-Communist purge—led by Suharto following the fall of Sukarno—as a strategic and even positive development for U.S. interests. This purge, which killed at least half a million people, was later acknowledged by the C.I.A. as one of the worst mass murders of the twentieth century, revealing the extent of Western complicity and Cold War politics in shaping global narratives of violence.

The documentary shifts focus from victims to perpetrators, particularly Anwar Congo, who openly recounts and reenacts his role in the killings. Oppenheimer’s radical approach—inviting perpetrators to stage their own dramatized versions of the violence—exposes a chilling absence of remorse and a deep entanglement of memory, performance, and self-deception. These reenactments blur the line between reality and fiction, revealing how individuals and societies construct narratives that justify or obscure atrocities. In Indonesia, where such events are largely absent from official history, figures like Congo are still celebrated, underscoring a collective denial embedded in national memory.

 

The article situates this film within a broader tradition of documentary experimentation, referencing works like Shoah by Claude Lanzmann and The Fog of War by Errol Morris. Like these films, The Act of Killing interrogates how perpetrators rationalize violence, raising unsettling ethical questions about guilt, responsibility, and the idea that “war crimes are defined by the winners.” This notion echoes reflections by Robert McNamara on the moral ambiguity of wartime actions, suggesting that power often determines the boundaries of justice.

 

Ultimately, the documentary becomes a profound exploration of memory and its distortions. By forcing perpetrators to confront their own past through performance, Oppenheimer reveals cracks in their self-narratives. The film’s most powerful moments emerge when these constructed identities falter, and suppressed guilt begins to surface. The article concludes by emphasizing how The Act of Killing not only revisits a largely ignored historical atrocity but also challenges viewers to reflect on how histories are told, who gets to tell them, and how nations live with the stories they choose to remember—or forget.

 

Reference: 

https://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/the-weird-genius-of-the-act-of-killing

Journeying with Stranger Things - Review

          

I’ve spent a lot of time with Stranger Things over the years. Watching it stretch across five seasons feels a bit like growing up alongside it—except somewhere along the way, I think I started drifting apart from it.

Take Winona Ryder, for instance. I know her performance is meant to be intense, even frantic at times, but it often felt a little too much for me. Instead of pulling me into the moment, it sometimes pushed me out of it. When every emotion is turned all the way up, it stops feeling real. And then there’s the way the kids speak. Hearing children casually throw around lines like “dipshit” or “suck a fat one” just didn’t sit right with me. It felt less like natural dialogue and more like the show trying too hard to sound edgy. But it’s not all criticism—far from it.

What I genuinely appreciated is how the series handles memory. There’s this lingering sense that the characters are not just fighting monsters, but also trapped inside their own pasts. The Upside Down almost feels like a physical version of memory itself—dark, distorted, and impossible to escape. The idea of children being taken away into something unknown taps into a very primal fear. It reminded me of stories like Weapons, where that sense of vulnerability is front and centre. That said, the heavy focus on teenage emotions—romance, heartbreak, longing—did feel a bit overwhelming at times. Maybe it’s just me, but the “mushy teen” energy didn’t always land. And I can’t help but wonder: is the show leaning too much into it, or am I just no longer the audience for it?

Visually, though, the series is stunning. The creation of the Upside Down and the eerie presence of Vecna are genuinely impressive. The world feels textured, detailed, and alive in its own unsettling way. The music especially the use of 1980s pop and rock n roll tracks deserve a special mention too. It quietly threads everything together—sometimes you don’t even notice it, but it’s doing a lot of emotional work in the background. It connects moments, memories, and characters in a way that feels almost invisible.

And credit where it’s due—the Duffer Brothers have managed to hold attention across 42 episodes, which is no small achievement. That kind of consistency takes vision. I also loved the effort put into recreating the 1980s. The costumes, the sets, the tiny details—it all feels carefully built, not just thrown together for effect.

But more than anything, what stayed with me is a quieter thought: maybe I’ve changed. 

Maybe I’m no longer able to connect with that teenage emotional world in the same way. And that’s not really a flaw in the show—it’s just where I am now. In a strange way, Stranger Things ends up doing something unexpected. It doesn’t just tell a story about growing up. It makes you realise that you already have.

Media Scan - 26426 - The Hindu Sunday Magazine

 

Building Intelligence Without Knowing What It Is: The Paradox of AI’s Rise - Article Review

The article argues that while artificial intelligence has become one of the most powerful and heavily funded technological movements of our time, there is still no clear or shared understanding of what “intelligence” actually means. Drawing on the works of Karen Hao (Empire of AI), Max Fisher (The Chaos Machine), and Dwarkesh Patel (The Scaling Era), the piece presents a critical overview of the AI industry’s ambitions, contradictions, and consequences. It highlights how AI development is largely driven by the assumption that human intelligence can be reduced to language and replicated through massive data and computation, despite the lack of a precise definition. The article also connects current AI expansion to earlier technological patterns—especially social media—where engagement-driven systems reshaped human behavior in unintended and often harmful ways.

 

 At the same time, the narrative exposes a deeper “god complex” within the industry: a belief among some technologists that building superintelligent systems is both inevitable and beyond human control, even as they acknowledge the risks. This mindset is paired with enormous environmental and social costs, including resource extraction, energy consumption, and global inequalities. While AI has already contributed to advances in medicine, science, and everyday life, the article suggests that its development is proceeding without sufficient ethical clarity or accountability. Ultimately, these books collectively portray AI not just as a technological revolution, but as a reflection of human ambition, uncertainty, and the unresolved question of what it truly means to think, know, and be intelligent.

LitRadar - April 26, 2026 - Truth, Memory, and the Stories We Tell

In her genre-blending documentary Stories We Tell, filmmaker Sarah Polley takes on a deeply personal investigation into family, memory, and truth. The film operates as both an intimate memoir and a detective story, where Polley pieces together fragments of her family’s past through interviews, archival footage, and reenactments. What emerges is not a single, definitive truth, but a tapestry of perspectives. Each family member offers their own version of events—honest, yet often contradictory. These overlapping narratives reveal an essential insight: memory is not a fixed record but a reconstruction, shaped by emotion, time, and personal need. At the heart of the film lies the figure of Polley’s mother, whose life and early death become the emotional anchor of the story. As recollections shift between present-day interviews and nostalgia-infused glimpses of the past, the film highlights how memory is colored by longing, grief, and imagination. One of the most compelling ideas in Stories We Tell is that truth is not singular but “mosaic-like.” It exists somewhere between conflicting accounts rather than within any one perspective. This challenges the conventional belief that memory functions like a camera. Instead, it suggests that we constantly reinterpret the past to make sense of our present. The film also explores storytelling as a coping mechanism. Families, like individuals, create shared narratives to process trauma, secrets, and emotional complexities. These “family mythologies” are not necessarily false—they are meaningful constructions that help people endure and understand their experiences. Polley’s work reflects her broader artistic focus on relationships and emotional depth, seen in earlier films like Away from Her and Take This Waltz. However, Stories We Tell takes this exploration further by turning the lens inward, examining not just relationships, but the narratives that sustain them. Ultimately, the film leaves us with a profound realization: we may all be distorting the past in subtle ways, yet we are also, in our own perspectives, telling a version of the truth. Our stories—messy, contradictory, and deeply human—are what shape our identities and connect us to one another. In this sense, Stories We Tell is not just about one family. It is about all of us, and the stories we construct to understand who we are.

 

https://storieswetellmovie.com/sarah.html

Media Scan 12-04-26 - The Hindu - Sunday magazine

 

Roots of Resistance: Reading the Rise of Dalit Literature - Article Summary - 5-04-26 - Sunday Literary Magazine - The Hindu

In recent years, Dalit literature has moved from the margins to a more visible and powerful space in Indian literary culture. What was once confined to regional languages and limited readerships is now expanding through translations, academic engagement, and a growing community of readers. This shift is not just literary—it is deeply political and cultural.

 

At its core, Dalit writing is rooted in lived experience. It speaks of caste oppression, humiliation, survival, and resistance, but it also goes beyond testimony. Contemporary Dalit literature experiments with genres—fiction, memoir, speculative writing, philosophy—and reimagines history, memory, and identity. It challenges dominant narratives and asks uncomfortable questions about justice, equality, and representation.

 

What makes this body of work especially significant is its diversity. There is no single Dalit voice. Instead, there are multiple perspectives shaped by region, gender, class, and experience. Writers engage with themes such as labour, spirituality, sexuality, and modernity, while also dialoguing with global ideas. For instance, works that bring Ambedkar into conversation with Western philosophy open new intellectual pathways.

 

Importantly, Dalit literature is not only about critique—it is also about reclaiming dignity and imagining alternatives. Concepts like Begumpura envision a just society free from caste hierarchies. Similarly, narratives rooted in community life foreground resilience and collective memory.

 

 

Books to Explore 

Sanatan – Sharankumar Limbale (translated by Meena Kandasamy)

The Ambedkar and Nietzsche: Provocations – Ankith Kawade

The Vulgarity of Caste: Dalits, Sexuality, and Humanity in Modern India – 

Shailaja Paik

Untouchable Spring – G. Kalyana Rao (translated by Alladi Uma & M. Sridhar)

The Blaft Book of Anti-Caste SF (Blaft Publication)

Gail Omvedt's Seeking Begumpura (Navayana)

S. Karuppasamy's first book, Naan Loco Pilot Aana Kathai 

(The Story of Becoming a Loco Pilot, Tathagata Publishing House)

 

Media Scan - 5-04-26

 

Media Scan 1-04-26

Two Sides of the Same Profession

 

The Hindi vs English debate

Summary of the article which appeared in scroll.in by Suraj Gunwant is Assistant Professor, Department of English, Ewing Christian College, University of Allahabad.

 

The article argues that English is often wrongly blamed for the decline of India’s regional languages, while in reality, Hindi plays a more immediate and powerful role—especially in North India. Hindi dominates everyday communication, education, and social interactions, making speakers of smaller languages like Bhojpuri or Braj feel inferior and pushing them to shift toward standard Hindi for respect and mobility.

 

This shift is driven largely by aspiration rather than force: families encourage children to adopt Hindi as a “better” or more respectable language, leading to the gradual disappearance of mother tongues in homes and communities. The process is subtle and often disguised as adopting proper manners or educated speech.

 

The author concludes that India should avoid promoting any one regional language over others and instead adopt a balanced multilingual model, where English can function as a neutral link language while regional languages are preserved for cultural identity.

 

https://scroll.in/article/1090131/an-english-professor-writes-why-hindi-is-to-blame-for-the-decline-of-indias-other-languages

Media Scan - 25326

 

Media Scan 23-3-26

 

Media Scan - March 22, 2026

Len Deighton Remembered - Media Scan - 200326

Media Scan - 17-03-26

 

Media Scan - 15-03-26

The Hindu 15-03-26

Jürgen Habermas was one of the most influential philosophers and sociologists of the modern era. He died at the age of 96 in Starnberg near Munich, Germany. He was regarded as one of the most important philosophers of the 20th century. His ideas significantly influenced philosophy, sociology, and political theory. Jürgen Habermas is best known for developing the concept of the public sphere, which describes a space where individuals engage in rational discussion on matters of public concern. Habermas became a key intellectual figure in post-World War II Germany. His best-known work is the two-volume book The Theory of Communicative Action, which explores communication, rational debate, and modern society. He worked across several academic disciplines, including philosophy, sociology, and political thought. Growing up during Nazi Germany and witnessing the collapse of Nazism in 1945 shaped his intellectual and political outlook. He engaged with the left-wing student movement, but also warned about the danger of extremist tendencies, calling them “left-wing fascism.” German Chancellor Friedrich Merz praised Habermas as one of Germany’s most significant thinkers and said his voice would be greatly missed. 

 

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/14/books/jurgen-habermas-dead.html 

Media Scan 12-03-26