Our essential reads for the week
In a declining playback economy, what does the show offer to participants beyond the potential for virality?
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.
Peshawari Ice Cream, nestled in Karachi’s Saddar, is not just any ice cream parlour, it is a litmus test of belonging, especially with many copycat branches spread across the city. Sobh Saeed Rid, who moved to Karachi four years ago, explores the nostalgia of flavour and how an ice cream parlour founded in 1948 continues to foster community.
In a society where desire of any kind is heavily policed, a show exclusively centred on finding your own partner while the country watches held potential - but did end up living up to that potential?
From the hauntings of The Cow to the neurosis of Hamoon, Dariush Mehrjui’s oeuvre offers a fragile terrain of possibility
From war reportage to the Hollywood red carpet, being able to conduct an effective interview seems to be an increasingly rare skill
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...
𝘒𝘦𝘦𝘳𝘶 by Fauzia Rafique, translated from the Punjabi by Haider Shahbaz (2025), follows Muhammad Hussain Khan ‘𝘒𝘦𝘦𝘳𝘶’ who...
Maha Khan Phillips takes us on a whirlwind, absorbing adventure in her fourth novel, 𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘔𝘶𝘴𝘦𝘶𝘮 𝘋𝘦𝘵𝘦𝘤𝘵𝘪𝘷𝘦.
By Saba Imtiaz
By Umair Javed
By Maryam Jillani
By Haroon Sethi
Stories, Cultures, and Landscapes
Reflecting on the Zeitgeist
Niilofur Farrukh, former CEO and Managing Trustee of Karachi Biennale Trust, reflects on how the organisation has sustained itself for the last ten years, despite overwhelming obstacles, from hosting biennales in a city on the brink of infrastructural collapse to funding precarity.
Mar 26, 2026
From the hauntings of The Cow to the neurosis of Hamoon, Dariush Mehrjui’s oeuvre offers a fragile terrain of possibility
Mar 30, 2026
Niilofur Farrukh, former CEO and Managing Trustee of Karachi Biennale Trust, reflects on how the organisation has sustained itself for the last ten years, despite overwhelming obstacles, from hosting biennales in a city on the brink of infrastructural collapse to funding precarity.
Mar 26, 2026
From the hauntings of The Cow to the neurosis of Hamoon, Dariush Mehrjui’s oeuvre offers a fragile terrain of possibility
Mar 30, 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?
