In the essays assembled in Clearing a Space Chaudhuri draws on his own experiences to offer
an acute exploration of what it means to be a modern Indian in relation to history. Often
beginning with the personal he inquires into the nature of the secular in India into the
history of such categories as the West the foreign the global and the exotic and into the
frequently torn and self-divided nature of modern Indian identity. With the same elegance and
intelligence for which he has become known Chaudhuri writes in these essays about Indian
popular culture and high culture travel and location in Paris Bombay Dublin Calcutta and
New York empire and nationalism Indian and Western cinema the place of the everyday in
Indian creativity music art and literature politics race cosmopolitanism urban landscapes
Hollywood and Bollywood Anglophone India internationalism globalisation the Indian English
tradition that predates Rushdie post-colonialism and much more.
