Pankaj Mishra's novel 'Run and Hide' examines caste, globalization and toxic masculinity in modern India

Pankaj Mishra's second novel 'Run and Hide' arrives two decades after his debut, marking a return to fiction following his non-fiction career analyzing Western liberalism's impact on India and the Global South. The narrative follows three men from impoverished backgrounds—Arun, Vivendra, and Aseem—who meet as roommates at Delhi's Indian Institute of Technology in the early 1980s. Their brutal sexual initiation by seniors, organized according to caste hierarchy, launches their divergent paths of reinvention in a modernizing India. Aseem becomes a celebrity author attacking elites while craving their acceptance, Vivendra transforms into a Wall Street billionaire with criminal tendencies, and Arun retreats to the Himalayan foothills as a translator. Arun narrates the story to his abandoned girlfriend Alia, whose wealthy background introduces themes of globalization, diaspora, and fluid identity. The novel explores how social media creates performative activism and false agency, exemplified by Arun's father posting anti-Sonia Gandhi content while praising Narendra Modi. Mishra examines toxic masculinity, caste mobility, and the tension between traditional structures and contemporary rootlessness. Published by Hutchinson Heinemann, the hardcover costs £16.99.