In this issue

The theme of this issue is black and white. However, in the “real world”, black-and-white views are making our planet a dangerous place to live in. Certitudes can lead to bigotry. The diktat of my-way-or-no-way has resulted in walls being erected between communities, castes, haves and have-nots. We need to be able to dwell in ambiguity.

In his photo essay, Johnny Miller takes a look from above at ghettoised communities through drone photography, while Bengaluru-based Swedish writer Zac O’Yeah ruminates on the modern white man’s burden, what it is like to be a white man in contemporary India. Shashi Tharoor makes the case for Hindu- ism to retain its traditional inclusiveness, Anasua Chatterjee tracks the increasing ghettoisation of Muslims in our cities and Purvai Aranya mulls over the generational di erences and complexities in the #MeToo movement. In conversation with Rukminee Guha Thakurta, photographer Dayanita Singh explains why black-and-white. And designer David Abraham demonstrates the importance of binaries in the work of Abraham & Thakore. Rashmi Sawhney writes about the greys in the cinema noir of Fritz Lang, and Hansda Sowvendra Shekhar examines the presence and absence of black in the sky.

Elsewhere, Sohini Chattopadhyay discusses the lack of an Indian culture of remembrance. Alpana Chowdhury looks at Bombay through the eyes of taxi drivers in Hindi cinema. In photo essays, Chitvan Gill captures the quotidian lives of colourful circuswalas, while Ritesh Uttamchandani focuses on the quirky and the by-the-way. Shoili Kanungo’s whimsical comic asks if we are dead.

We also have translations of T Janakiraman and Zamiruddin Ahmad, new fiction by Sumana Roy and Salil Chaturvedi, and new poetry and translations by Imtiaz Dharker, Ranjit Hoskote and too many more to list....

The Indian Quarterly Magazine Description:

The Indian Quarterly (IQ) is a national and international magazine. We hope that just as The New Yorker exhibits a distinctly Manhattan sensibility and always contains articles about New York City, IQ will manifest the fact that it is edited and published in Mumbai through its cosmopolitan and open-minded perspective on the world and on India.

In fact, we hope to provide a unique way of interpreting our ever changing culture, and to define our own experiences through the strength of thought, ideas and imagery, be it in the form of fact, fiction, poetry, illustration or photography. IQ is therefore a paean to the polyphonic nature of reflection and the creativity that is its outcome.