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Lead book review

Oh! Calcutta! Amartya Sen’s childhood memories brim with nostalgia

From Bengali schoolboy to citizen of the world – Amartya Sen’s autobiography is a joy, says Philip Hensher

10 July 2021

9:00 AM

10 July 2021

9:00 AM

Home in the World: A Memoir Amartya Sen

Allen Lane, pp.480, 25

Santiniketan, in West Bengal, about 100 miles from Kolkata, is one of the most magical places on Earth. The Bengali writer Rabindranath Tagore used a stretch of family land there to set up a great university. Modestly scaled buildings are scattered among groves; classes are conducted under the trees. The last time I was there, our rickshaw driver puttered to a halt outside a handsome residence.

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