NERMEEN SHAIKH: So, could you say a little bit more about, I mean, as the writer of two beautiful novels, as well as literally hundreds and hundreds of literary nonfiction, what you see as the role of literature in this context? You referred to it, in fact, in that same lecture, this context, as a “blitzkrieg of idiocy.” And the other point you made about literature being essential, fiction being essential to saying what cannot, in any other context, be said? And you cited Kashmir.

ARUNDHATI ROY: Well, yes, I cited Kashmir, and I cited James Baldwin, who says that “and they wouldn’t believe me, precisely because they knew that what I was saying was true.” So, basically, I think, you know, it’s a—to me, the reason—I wonder sometimes, in this age of so much, you know, WhatsApp and video and Netflix and movies, and living in a country where so many people are either semiliterate or illiterate, why is it that a certain kind of writing, like, say, my essays, and even my books now, you know, they’re translated—

NERMEEN SHAIKH: Your novels, you mean.

ARUNDHATI ROY: —almost sort of—my novels—spontaneously into so many languages, into 51 languages in the case of The Ministry, many Indian languages. You know, when I go to speak in places, like anywhere in India, literally thousands show up. Why? Not because I’m some superstar, but because everybody is looking to understand what is happening at this moment, when really the era that we think we know and understand is coming to an end. And this is the simplest way of saying a complicated thing, you know? Literature is.

And I feel that, you know, the radical understanding now has to come from not thinking of climate—”Oh, I’m a specialist in climate change,” “I’m a specialist in river valleys,” “I’m a specialist on Kashmir,” “I’m a specialist”—you know, this kind of compartmentalization is actually reducing the real problem that we have, because now you have to understand there’s a connection between caste and climate change and capitalism and nationalism and internationalism. And I think this is where literature and a way of grappling with history as a kind of supple narrative is important.

AMY GOODMAN: Telling truths, as you quote James Baldwin, saying it is easier to often tell those truths in fiction rather than nonfiction. Which is your preferred way of writing? As we move into your next book coming out in June, a thousand pages of your nonfiction essays.

ARUNDHATI ROY: Well, you know, as I said in my lecture yesterday, people—apart from which is my preferred way, other people have their preferred forms of my writing. But to me, they are both part of my body. You know, they are both part of the way I think. And I would only say that the nonfiction that I have written has always been an urgent intervention. And together, somehow, when I looked at it together, the urgency put together over 20 years creates a special kind of narrative, a special kind of history, you know, because even the nonfiction, I see when I read it—

AMY GOODMAN: We have five seconds.

ARUNDHATI ROY: —I’m always telling stories.

AMY GOODMAN: We’re going to do Part 2 and post it online at democracynow.org. And there, we’ll ask you about Kashmir as a nuclear flashpoint. Arundhati Roy, the great writer. I’m Amy Goodman, with Nermeen Shaikh.