Hold Everything Dear:Dispatches on Survival and Resistance
From the War on Terror to resistance in Ramallah and traumatic dislocation in the Middle East, Berger explores the uses of art as an instrument of political resistance. Visceral and passionate, Hold Everything Dear is a profound meditation on the far extremes of human behaviour, and the underlying despair. Looking at Afghanistan, Palestine, and Iraq, he makes an impassioned attack on the poverty and loss of freedom at the heart of such unnecessary suffering. These essays offer reflections on the political at the core of artistic expression and even at the center of human existence itself.
Reviews
One of the most influential intellectuals of our time.
I admire and love John Berger’s books ... Not since Lawrence has there been a writer who offers such attentiveness to the sensual world with responsiveness to the imperatives of conscience. He is a wonderful artist and thinker.
John Berger teaches us how to think, how to feel, how to stare at things till we see what we thought wasn’t there. But above all he teaches us how to love in the face of adversity. He is a master.
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Berger is a writer one demands to know more about ... an intriguing and powerful mind and talent.
New York Times -
Berger’s is a humane and uniquely confiding voice.
Teju Cole -
Powerful polemicist and precise poet.
Times -
Berger is never less than eloquent... a heartfelt advocate of those without hope.
Metro -
Any book by John Berger is an event … admirers will recognise the characteristic blend of sympathy and lucidity, directness of address, human warmth, and cosmopolitan example.
Times Literary Supplement