The Green Book

Many of the drawings and paintings in this book are the result of the walks I have undertaken. Don't stop walking! And keep a journal. What you draw is a way of keeping a diary, of course, but also write words to record what you see.

On a fast-heating planet, it has become more important than ever to hold on to every vestige of hope. We must save every drop of creativity to imagine new futures. We must remember that like leafy trees, art also offers us shade, and that literature quenches our thirst for finding the right words for every emotion.

In these pages, the acclaimed author Amitava Kumar shows us that great literature often begins as jottings made in writers" notebooks. His examples extend from Virginia Woolf and John Berger to Mohandas Gandhi and Shiva Naipaul. In Kumar's own notebooks, we find written accounts and drawings of travels across continents: among mountains and rivers, walks in parks and journeys on highways, even a visit to a prison. In each instance, we discover what comes from noticing. There are many ways of seeing—but seeing is, in fact, being.

The Green Book gives us a profound insight into the mind of a writer who observes closely and attempts to capture in images and words what is happening to the world around us.