Things That Can and Cannot Be Said - Softcover

Cusack, John; Roy, Arundhati

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0241980089 ISBN 13: 9780241980088

Publisher: Penguin, 2016

Synopsis

From the bestselling author of The Ministry of Utmost Happiness

An extraordinary secret meeting between four brilliant political activists: Booker Prize-winner Arundhati Roy, NSA whistle-blower Edward Snowden, Pentagon Papers insider Daniel Ellsberg and acclaimed actor John Cusack

'What sort of love is this love that we have for countries? What sort of country is it that will ever live up to our dreams? What sort of dreams were these that have been broken?'

In 2014, four people met in secret in a hotel room in Moscow. Each was a leading global advocate for government transparency and accountability: they had come together to talk. Over the course of two days, Arundhati Roy, Edward Snowden, John Cusack and Daniel Ellsburg shared ideas and beliefs - about the Vietnam War and the Pentagon Papers, the NSA and the ongoing crises in the Middle East, the American government and the nature of activism.

Co-authored by Roy and Cusack, and interleaving verbatim conversations with narrated recollections, this Penguin Special captures an historic moment. Interrogating the geopolitical forces that shape our world, it is both political and personal, activist and humanist - irreverent, funny and absolutely urgent. In Things That Can and Cannot Be Said, Arundhati Roy and John Cusack issue a powerful rallying cry, a call to resistance against America's ongoing, malign hegemony.

About this title

About the Author:

Arundhati Roy, author of The God of Small Things, was trained as an architect. She has worked as a production designer and has written the screenplays for two films.

John Cusack is a writer, filmmaker, actor, and a board member of the Freedom of the Press Foundation. He has written the screenplays for the movies Grosse Point Blank, High Fidelity, and War, Inc., with Mark Leyner and Jeremy Pikser, among many others. His writing has appeared widely, including the Guardian, Truthout, and Outlook India.

Review:

''[Arundhati Roy is] an electrifying political essayist.'' --Booklist, praise for the author

''On its surface, the essay collection offers an account of Edward Snowden's 2014 meeting with John Cusack, Arundhati Roy, and Daniel Ellsberg. Things That Can and Cannot Be Said is less about Snowden's 2013 decision to leak classified NSA data than it is about the context of that decision, offering a statement on the surveillance state as it relates to war and peace in the twenty-first century...'It definitely cannot not be written about...because the world is a millipede that inches forward on millions of real conversations.' Things That Can and Cannot Be Said is an unapologetically radical account of several such real conversations aiming to do just that: inch the world forward.'' --Shelf Awareness

About this edition

• Publisher: Penguin
• Publication date: 2016
• ISBN 10: 0241980089
• ISBN 13: 9780241980088
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 128