Amitava Kumar, a Hindu Indian writer based in the United States, marries a Pakistani Muslim in 1999 when India and Pakistan are at war: “I felt good about marrying ‘the enemy,’” he writes, “ … my marriage had opened a new track for people-to-people diplomacy.” Then he is named in an online blacklist of so-called Hindu traitors. While his journey begins in an ethnic enclave in New York, Kumar also travels through the South Asian continent, as everyone from relatives to religious leaders weighs in on the age-old tension, distrust, and outright hatred based not on individual encounters but the blindness of national and religious identity.
Review: “New and Notable Books, AsianWeek, April 7, 2005
Tidbit: Kumar was a provocative, very funny guest at SALTAF 2007 (South Asian Literary and Theater Arts Festival), a much-anticipated, highly-attended annual fall event sponsored by the Smithsonian APA Program and NetSAP-DC.
Readers: Adult
Published: 2005
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