I doubt I will find time to read this interviewee's book, but I really enjoyed her perspective on poverty and her role as a journalist reporting about poverty. As someone who has always benefited from significant privilege and relative wealth, it is easy to fall into certain patterns of thinking about poverty and to lose sight of the diversity of individuals living in poverty. I'm glad there are dedicated writers like Katherine Boo working to counteract those patterns of thinking.
"Reporting Poverty" by Emily Brennan with Katherine Boo
Published in Guernica, September 4, 2012
http://www.guernicamag.com/interviews/reporting-poverty/?src=longreads
Eric
I did end up reading the book a few months ago and it was hard for me to remember that I was reading a piece of non-fiction. The people she reports on have such dramatic lives that do seem to always hang in a balance between having everything they need to be happy and complete destitution.
ReplyDeleteI didn't ever feel like she was exaggerating their lives to prove a political point. But because she just told their individual stories, I had a hard time connecting it to larger issues at play in India.