Htwknd News

I read my first Asterix when I was in Class 3. I had been taken to visit an aunt

In a flat in Manchester in January 1980, Ian Curtis (yes, that Ian Curtis, a few months from becoming post-punk s most mourned voice at 23) of the band Joy Division sat gluing coarse sandpaper onto record covers. What he and a few others were building, sheet b

Kirat Brahma began making dolls when he was six. His first one was a papier-m ch bird, he says

A few days before Independence Day, I asked my daughter and her friends, all aged 13 or 14: What does freedom mean to you? freedom to me would be being able to dye my hair, get alotttt of piercings, being able to travel the world and being able to go out witho

How does a deaf person direct a delivery app rider, or deal with a customer service call from their bank? How does a blind person choose the right shoes for the day?

After zamindars, the most significant patrons of terracotta temples were merchants. The surge in textile exports and the monetization of the economy under the Mughals in the 17th and 18th centuries enabled merchants to become wealthy and to replicate the templ

They last 15 to 20 minutes. But for over 125 years, fashion shows have shaped what we wear, how we see ourselves and others, altered economies, and held up a mirror to fears and desires

We don t think it will happen to us, because our friends are decent people, right? When it does happen, it can feel like there are no right answers: Does one tell a friend their partner is likely cheating on them?

It isn t just the samosa, called sambuus in Somalia. There are plenty of culinary cousins that link India and this East African country

When Helen Phillips began to write Hum in 2019, it felt like speculative fiction.In her future world, people found it hard to breathe as the worst effects of the climate crisis kicked in; their jobs were threatened by evolving technology, forcing them into str

The US is celebrating 250 with some breathtaking displays of art and heritage.The Smithsonian Institution s Our Shared Future: 250 spans museums, libraries, research centres and the institute s zoological park in Washington DC. New York s Metropolitan Museum o

After weeks spent trying to solve a mathematical problem, French mathematician Henri Poincar was so fed up, he boarded a bus to the scenic town of Coutances. He needed a break

A friend of many years invited me to lunch at one of Mumbai s finest restaurants. The meal was excellent

From dark rooms to deep dives, the best music finds you when you re actually listening I wrote last time about a Pitchblack Playback deep-listening session I attended in Helsinki, and how it altered my view of an album I thought I knew intimately: Who s Next b...

Goodness leaps out at you in the unlikeliest places, in Ann Patchett s books. Bel Canto (2001), which won the Women s Prize (then called the Orange Prize for Fiction) and the PEN/Faulkner Award, is about an unlikely friendship between a band of terrorists and...