Falling For the Village Romantics
Farming is venerated in India, chiefly by those who are not farmers. An overwhelming majority of India’s farmers are unable to share this quaint adoration because they are impoverished.
Posts by Manu Joseph
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The Common Reader, a publication of Washington University in St. Louis, offers the best in reviews, articles and creative non-fiction engaging the essential debates and issues of our time.
The Current Issue
The real Elvis is American, remember, and America is a consumer society. The desires we project, the stuff we buy—that is what feels real to us. It lets us have any Elvis we want. He left plenty of kitsch in his wake, plenty of pseudo-religion, plenty of Elvis jokes—but he was not, is not, a joke. He lived our contradictions, released our inhibitions, and lost himself in the process.
