Reading Arundhati Roy's Fiction and Nonfiction
January 9, 2026โข251 words
To be honest, spending three weeks in a row reading fiction and nonfiction from Arundhati Roy sounds like a demanding, and probably a little draining emotional workout; not in the least. The best way, however, is to read both her fiction and non-fiction at the same time. It's similar to reading the technical score of My Seditious Heart after hearing a melancholic tune in The God of Small Things and realizing why those notes hurt so much. You begin to realize that for Roy, "storytelling" and "activism" are simply two different ways of shouting the truth; there isn't really a wall between them.
You must have a complete "aha!" moment when you consider her most recent memoir, Mother Mary Comes to Me. The memoir reveals that the "Love Laws" were more than just a skilled literary device. For years, readers viewed Ammu in her first book as this tragic, semi-fictional rebel. They were the real, oppressive limits of her early years. The characters in Roy's fiction feel so much more real when you see the author's Mother - Mary Roy, a fierce feminist pioneer educator and a terrifyingly complex parent. You come to understand that the "Small Things" she has been writing about for thirty years were actually her psychological wounds.
I highly recommend Arundhati Roy's fiction, The God of Small Things and her large collection of nonfiction essays of My Seditious Heart.