ASNC is pleased to co-sponsor this event with the Mechanics' Institute. In this intriguing portrait of the minds that shaped the modern Asian world, author Pankaj Mishra reviews historical events from the Near, Middle and Far East and the important intellectuals, reformers and revolutionaries from the past two centuries, thinkers who shared a goal of a greater Asia. Sun Yatsen, Liang Qichao, Nehru, and Jamal al-din al Afghani are among the figures examined in this lucid and bracing view of colonialism and its aftermath. Mishra's gripping and entertaining narrative challenges popular assumptions about modern Asia's revolt against the West, and brings to light the leaders who have shaped contemporary China, India and the Muslim world.

Pankaj Mishra is the author of numerous books and anthologies, including the award-winning The Romantics (2001), which won the Los Angeles Times' Art Seidenbaum award for first fiction, and Temptation of the West: How to be Morden in India, Pakistan, and Beyond, which was featured in the New York Times' 100 Best Books of the Year in 2006. He also writes literary and political essays for the New York Times, the New York Review of Books, The Guardian, the New Yorker, London Review of Books, Bloomberg View, among other American, British, and Indian publications.

Read Asia Blog's interview with Pankaj Mishra