Read me a poem
Pádraig Ó Tuama has been hosting the On Being Studios podcast Poetry Unbound since January 2020 (Spotify, Apple Podcasts, etc.). Released every Monday and Friday, with two seasons in a year, the Irish theologian-writer guides listeners with an immersive reading of one poem in each episode. Season 5 ended on 3 June with Yu Xiuhua’s Crossing Half Of China To Sleep With You; season 6 starts in September. Some of my favourites are Yu’s, and Tiana Clark’s My Therapist Wants To Know About My Relationship To Work, from this season; and Ross Gay’s Ode To Buttoning And Unbuttoning My Shirt from season 1. “Poetry for me is an embrace of the world,” says O’ Tuama, who interweaves each reading with something personal and philosophical. Hit play, close your eyes, and let poetry take over.—Nipa Charagi
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Imagine a story
As soon as you open The Theatre Of Ghosts, you can tell that the book is set in a village in Assam—with its houses on stilts, bamboo gates, small ponds framed by banana trees, and ladies wearing mekhela chador. Illustrated by Pankaj Saikia, the story follows the adventures of Junali and Rimjhim, who are off to see the bhaona, a traditional drama form, on the river island of Majuli. This book is not just interesting for its story, but for its very format—it’s a wordless book for emerging readers. The Theatre Of Ghosts encourages children to infer the plot from the cues embedded in the visuals, the detailing, and more. Each time you read it, you will notice newer things in the visuals, which will in turn add to the way you build the story in your head. Each time is a new experience for kids and adults alike.—Avantika Bhuyan
Dancing about music
The first time director Andrew Dominik and musician Nick Cave teamed up for a documentary was in 2016, on One More Time With Feeling. It was a decidedly heavy affair, imbued with grief at the shock death of Cave’s son, shot in funereal black and white. Their new collaboration, This Much I Know To Be True (on MUBI), puts the grief behind and offers upliftment. It’s little more than a series of live performances by Cave and bandmate Warren Ellis, choreographed and captured in rich colour by Dominik and cinematographer Robbie Ryan, punctuated by Cave’s philosophical ruminations. But the expressiveness of Cave and Ellis as performers and the empathetic, inventive eye of Dominik make this a euphoric document of art in motion.—Uday Bhatia
Save your skin
This dermatologist-recommended sunscreen came into my life when I saw a skin doctor for pigmentation issues. She told me it could have been caused by the blue light exposure from screens over the past two years of the pandemic, when we spent most of our time indoors and didn’t use sunscreen. Tinted sunscreens are better at blocking blue light, and Re’equil’s Sheer Zinc Tinted Mineral Sunscreen with SPF 50 (with a lot of PA++ signs after that) provides not just sun-protection indoors and outdoors, it also offers some coverage like a BB cream. If you have dry skin, using a moisturiser alongside is a must—the sequence of application being moisturiser before sunscreen if the sunscreen is a mineral one, like this one. Oh, it is also non-scented and doesn’t leave a white cast, making it an all-round winner.—Shrabonti Bagchi
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