Arundhati Roy
Indian author and activist, winner of the Booker Prize.
via Wikipedia: Tarun Tejpal · see source
Suzanna Arundhati Roy, born 24 November 1961 in Shillong, then part of Undivided Assam, is an Indian author and political activist. Her mother, Mary Roy, was a Malayali Christian women’s rights activist from the Jacobite Syrian denomination; her father, Rajib Roy, was a Bengali Hindu who later converted to Christianity and worked as a tea plantation manager. Her parents divorced when she was two, after which she moved to Kerala with her mother and brother, living briefly with her grandfather in Ooty before settling in Kerala, where her mother founded a school. Roy attended Corpus Christi in Kottayam and the Lawrence School in Lovedale, then studied architecture at the School of Planning and Architecture in New Delhi. There she met architect Gerard da Cunha, with whom she lived in Delhi and Goa until 1982.
Roy’s early career included television and film work. She acted in *Massey Sahib* (1985) and wrote screenplays for *In Which Annie Gives It Those Ones* (1989), based on her architecture student experiences, and *Electric Moon* (1992), both directed by her then-husband Pradip Krishen. She won the National Film Award for Best Screenplay in 1988 for the former. In 1994, she criticized Shekhar Kapur’s *Bandit Queen* in an essay, questioning the ethics of restaging a living woman’s rape without her consent.
Her first novel, *The God of Small Things*, begun in 1992 and completed in 1996, draws heavily on her childhood in Aymanam. It won the 1997 Booker Prize, became the best-selling book by a non-expatriate Indian author, and received widespread acclaim in American and Canadian media, though UK and Indian responses were more mixed, with some critics calling it obscene. Roy later wrote the television serial *The Banyan Tree* and the documentary *DAM/AGE: A Film with Arundhati Roy* (2002). Her second novel, *The Ministry of Utmost Happiness*, was published in 2017, longlisted for the Man Booker Prize, and a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award. Her nonfiction was collected in *My Seditious Heart* (2019). In 2024, she won the PEN Pinter Prize, sharing it with imprisoned British-Egyptian writer Alaa Abd El-Fattah. Her memoir *Mother Mary Comes to Me*, focusing on her early life with her mother, was published in September 2025. In 2026, she withdrew from the Berlin International Film Festival after jury president Wim Wenders stated the jury must stay
- field
- Author, screenwriter, political activist
- nationality
- Indian
Verified Timeline
Lore & Background
The semi-autobiographical novel drew on her childhood in Aymanam, Kerala. Roy was born in Shillong, in what was then Undivided Assam, to a Bengali Hindu father who managed a tea plantation and a Malayali Christian mother who was a women’s rights activist. Her parents divorced when she was two, after which she, her mother, and her brother returned to Kerala, living for a time with her maternal grandfather in Ooty, Tamil Nadu. The family eventually settled in Kerala, where her mother founded a school. Roy attended Corpus Christi in Kottayam and the Lawrence School in Lovedale before studying architecture in New Delhi. Her first novel, *The God of Small Things*, won the 1997 Booker Prize and became the highest-selling book by a non-expatriate Indian author. She has since written a second novel, *The Ministry of Utmost Happiness*, and numerous essays on politics and culture, collected in volumes such as *My Seditious Heart*. A political activist involved in human rights and environmental causes, Roy was awarded the 2024 PEN Pinter Prize, which she shared with imprisoned British-Egyptian writer Alaa Abd El-Fattah. Her 2025 memoir, *Mother Mary Comes to Me*, focuses on her early years with her mother.
Reader's Guide
Arundhati Roy's significance lies in her dual role as a celebrated novelist and a provocative political activist. Her subsequent shift to activism and non-fiction—focusing on anti-globalization, nuclear disarmament, and human rights—has made her a polarizing figure. She has been both praised for her courage and criticized for her views, including her support for Kashmiri independence and her questioning of official narratives on terrorism. Roy's legacy is that of a writer who uses her platform to challenge power, even at personal risk, and whose work continues to inspire debate on literature, politics, and justice.
Did You Know?
- Her memoir *Mother Mary Comes to Me* was published in September 2025 and broadcast on BBC Radio 4.
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