Portrait of an Island on Fire [Paperback]

A deeply moving and revelatory reading experience, the essays collected inPortrait of an Island on Fireform a searing account of Mauritius at a crucial moment in its history. 

Unceasing in its critiques of racist, patriarchal abuses of power, in its unpicking of the ills at the core of contemporary Mauritian society and their roots, the collection is a milestone in thinking about the lasting social and political effects of colonialism and how they play out at the level of government policy, the handling of environmental issues, in schools, in hospitals, in families, in language. For all its well-placed anger, Ariel Saramandi’s sparklingly intelligent and intimate debut is full of love and momentum – a push for a better future for Mauritius and, by extension, for the world.

GBAriel Saramandi is an Anglo-Mauritian writer living in Mauritius. Her fiction and essays have been published byGranta, theLos Angeles Review of BooksandThe White Review, among others. She has reported on Mauritius for the likes of the BBC and NBC. Her work has been supported by the Tin House Winter Workshop 2023 and the Stinging Fly Summer School 2023. She is a member of the MMM’s Commission de Développement Durable.

‘Portrait of an Island on Fire is a fascinating look at Mauritius, a personal account of a homeland told with rage, rigour and love. Saramandi brilliantly, subtly teases out the threads of Mauritian history, politics and culture, honouring both the particularities of this unique place and showing the troubled connections – rapacious capitalism, racism, creeping authoritarianism, right-wing paranoia – that seem to stretch across the whole of our fragile planet. This is a beautifully written book of deep knowledge, righteous anger and fierce hope.’
— Lydia Kiesling, author of Mobility

‘Ariel Saramandi is a courageous and mes