Globalised reading: "Discontent and its Civilisations" by Mohsin Hamid

This was an impulse buy in Nottingham Waterstones based on two factors: (1) the apparent subject and (2) the author, whose novel How to Get Filthy Rich in Rising Asia delighted me hugely back in 2013. I say the apparent subject, because this book, which seemed to me from the cover to be a collection of musings of a globalised Asian about life in New York, London and Lahore, is at its core more a journalistic reflection on Pakistan, its multifaceted cultures, its contorted politics and its place in the world. The book is in fact a collection of articles written and published in the US, UK and Pakistan approximately since 2000, divided into three sections: Life, Art and Politics. 

In the Life section, probably the part I enjoyed reading the most, we learn a lot about Hamid himself, the experience of a articulate and learned Pakistani, with a talent for writing, who experiences life first in New York (until just before 9/11), then in London for the next eight years or so, then in Lahore. Hamid is humane and intelligent advocate for what is good about globalisation, refusing to be drawn into any notion that the world can be decoded in terms of "civilisations", still less antagonistic ones. If there is a constant thread through the book, it is this refusal to categorise people by monolithic labels, in particular, for obvious reasons, the label of Islam. His accounts of Pakistan in particular emphasise the staggering diversity of that country, something poorly understood by westerners, notably, and tragically, by US policymakers over the last 15 years. Hamid's "philosophy of life" (a grand term he would doubtless eschew), is ultimately deeply attractive in its inclusiveness and tolerance. If he is the ambassador of globalisation, and others, both East and West, perceived it as he does, then globalisation is to be embraced.

The Art section talks about writing. Hamid's three novels, Moth Smoke, The Reluctant Fundamentalist and the aforementioned How to Get Filthy Rich in Rising Asia have all been extremely well-received (mental note to make sure to read the first two sometime), but I did not, in all honesty, feel greatly enlightened by his "theory" on the subject of writing, though it was interesting, for example, to read his thoughts on the use of the second-person narrative in his third novel.

Ambassador for globalisation, Mohsin Hamid

In is in the Politics section that Hamid however leaves the amiable comfort zone of the earlier sections to get to grips with matters of greater complexity. He looks closely at Pakistan, open-eyed about the extent to which its troubles are self-generated, yet speaking out about how outsiders' mistakes have worsened the situation. The last piece, on drone strikes, is a powerful argument about how misguided this strategy has become, how its primary effect has been both to strengthen the militants and harden the anti-India military establishment, and how the price is being paid above all by innocent Pakistanis. 

Given Pakistan's centrality for world peace and geopolitics, it struck me reading this how little any of us really know about this vast and complex country. Reading Hamid's journalism gives a glimpse of something far richer, more complicated, above all more human than the West normally perceives. For that I am glad I read this book.