Our essential reads for the week
Behind a small screen, viewing short form content, is how we increasingly access news. How does it impact how we show up in the world?
𝘔𝘢𝘨𝘯𝘪𝘧𝘪𝘤𝘦𝘯𝘵 𝘗𝘶𝘯𝘫𝘢𝘣 is not only about preserving the past, but about imagining a future through the past, and will determine who the cultural future of the province belongs to
Badly enacted and unbelievably hopeful, can the Pakistani courtroom drama go beyond spectacle?
Pakistan’s economic challenge is not a shortage of labour. It is a shortage of productivity. While the country remains demographically expansionary, the slowly declining fertility rate means that the current youth bulge represents a narrowing window. In this piece, Ahmed Khan and Shahira Khan from the Punjab Skills Development Fund opine on a path forward.
The creator of the TV show Girls and the early 2000s favorite internet villain is back in the limelight, thanks to her new memoir
To understand our cultural attitudes around sexual intimacy, one need only look at contemporaryPakistani dramas, and how they push the boundaries of what is deemed acceptable
The creator of the TV show Girls and the early 2000s favorite internet villain is back in the limelight, thanks to her n...
For Mina Malik, Kiran Desai’s Booker nominated novel 𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘓𝘰𝘯𝘦𝘭𝘪𝘯𝘦𝘴𝘴 𝘰𝘧 𝘚𝘰𝘯𝘪𝘢 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘚𝘶𝘯𝘯𝘺 —a sweeping saga of love and fami...
This Is Where the Serpent Lives strives for scope but reduces class and gender to the familiar
Fatima Bhutto’s highly anticipated memoir, The Hour of The Wolf (Granta, 2026), is ostensibly a powerful memoir of grief...
Anissa Helou is a London-based chef, teacher and author who specialises in cooking and writing recipes for Mediterranean...
When a major Pakistani political figure is hanged, OK Town erupts in protest. A few miles away, Sir Baghi is surprised b...
‘𝘍𝘶𝘵𝘶𝘳𝘦 𝘙𝘦𝘢𝘥𝘺: 𝘐𝘯𝘯𝘰𝘷𝘢𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯, 𝘈𝘣𝘶𝘯𝘥𝘢𝘯𝘤𝘦 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘎𝘭𝘰𝘣𝘢𝘭 𝘚𝘰𝘶𝘵𝘩’ by Uzair Younus wonders if instead of a collapse, we are on t...
In Somebody Is Walking on Your Grave: My Cemetery Journeys (2025), Argentine journalist and novelist Mariana Enriquez bl...
By Saba Imtiaz
By Umair Javed
By Maryam Jillani
By Haroon Sethi
Stories, Cultures, and Landscapes
Reflecting on the Zeitgeist
As the US contends with its crumbling imperialism, is Hollywood incurring one political debt after another?
Apr 13, 2026
In an era when urban life is increasingly defined by impersonality and transactional relationships, Quetta hotels offer something many people unconsciously seek: genuine human connection.
Apr 07, 2026
As the US contends with its crumbling imperialism, is Hollywood incurring one political debt after another?
Apr 13, 2026
In an era when urban life is increasingly defined by impersonality and transactional relationships, Quetta hotels offer something many people unconsciously seek: genuine human connection.
Apr 07, 2026
SPORTS
Pakistani cricket has become synonymous with unpredictability. Despite occasional flashes of brilliance, watching the te...
SPORTS
After a four-year hiatus, Pakistan has finally progressed beyond the group stage at an ICC tournament. This qualificatio...
At the 2026 World Economic Forum in Davos, the European Union and its leading member states were no longer willing to quietly acquiesce to Washington’s demands under President Donald Trump.
Trump’s interest in Greenland is not new. During his first term, his suggestion that the United States should ‘buy’ Greenland was widely mocked, dismissed as a diplomatic oddity. Ahmad Jamal Wattoo looks at the strategic logic beneath the spectacle.
Debt-for-climate swaps are no longer boutique transactions, but are being pitched as a central tool to help countries break free from the vicious cycle of debt distress and climate vulnerability. Can the G77+China succeed in making them more than symbolic, clever deals on the margins?
