Between Hope and Despair: A Conversation with Arundhati Roy

Last November I attended a public conversation between Naomi Klein and Arundhati Roy at the Cooper Union Hall in New York City. Most people remember Roy for her ficiton. She won the Booker Prize in 1997 for her acclaimed novel THE GOD OF SMALL THINGS.

But in the decades since, Roy has been functioning as a self-assigned war correspondent and renegade essayist. With a keen artist’s eye, Roy writes about injustices within India and throughout the world as a result of unmitigated corporate power.

Naomi Klein commented on Roy’s bravery given that her writing is deeply threatening to Prime Minister Modi and Hindu nationalists. Klein wondered if Roy still felt safe living in India and if Roy could manage to have hope after everything she has witnessed and reported on.

“We put too much stock in hope,” Roy said. “There is a huge field of possibility between hope and hopelessness.”

Roy said that she will continue to do what she does, whether there is hope or not. She asked Klein if she would stop resisting Trump if there were no hope of beating him. Of course, you wouldn’t.

“Hope or no hope. This is what we do.”