@pratinavanil

Historian @UniofOxford Gandhi's Tomb (@AllenLaneBooks, 2027) @thetimes, @guardian, @lrb, @theTLS, @UnHerd @BGPrize judge 2025 Rep @DGALitAgents

 London and Oxford
seh.ox.ac.uk/people/pratinav-anil
Joined September 2014
  • Tweets2.5K
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Quite pleased to announce that I've signed a contract with Allen Lane for my new book, Gandhi’s Tomb: A History of India since Independence, 1947-2025 Colossal thanks to my agent @AparnaKumar95 and soon-to-be editor Chloe Currens 🪦🐧🍾 @PenguinUKBooks @DGALitAgents
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On the Hindenburg disaster - the sky’s Titanic - via Led Zeppelin and the Sopranos. My latest for @thetimes: thetimes.com/culture/books/a…

Inside the sky’s doomed Titanic — the Hindenburg disaster relived

Catherine Grace Katz’s Shadow Before the Flame is an expansive account of the last flight of the Zeppelin, an airship three times longer than a Boeing 747

thetimes.com
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A little light reading.
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Much enjoyed @dgjones’s rollicking history of castles from Troy to Disneyland, taking in (inter alia) Neuschwanstein and the supremely kitsch Strawberry Hill. My latest for @thetimes: thetimes.com/culture/books/a…
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Don't infantilise children. I'm back in @unherd: unherd.com/newsroom/censorin…

Censoring Horrible Histories won’t make history less horrible

There was always something paternalistic about the BBC — and a good thing it was, too. John Reith, its founding director-general, would scarcely have recoiled from the charge. As he saw it, his...

unherd.com
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We live in Peter Rachman's Britain. I'm back in @theipaper: inews.co.uk/opinion/slum-kin…

The slum king who showed British landlords how to get rich without working

Pratinav Anil: The man whose name became a byword for awful practices had a fascinating life – and left a terrible legacy

inews.co.uk
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Pratinav Anil retweeted
Mark Logan@Logan_ologySep 22
Replying to @pratinavanil
@pratinavanil good piece in the Times. Do read ! For 20 years I’ve been making argument that it’s only a matter of time that China will influence, and indeed compel, across many areas: economic, industrial, brands, technology, soft power Prof Anil gives insights into how 🧵
Pratinav Anil@pratinavanilSep 21
On Chinamaxxing (and why Britanniamaxxing isn't a thing). My @thetimes column: thetimes.com/comment/columni…
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On Chinamaxxing (and why Britanniamaxxing isn't a thing). My @thetimes column: thetimes.com/comment/columni…
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I read the new Jared Diamond and wasn't exactly impressed. My latest for @thetimes: thetimes.com/culture/books/a…

Take the Hamlet test: are you a great leader or just lucky?

In Profits, Prophets, Coaches and Kings, the pop historian Jared Diamond asks whether great men really make history?

thetimes.com
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Pratinav Anil retweeted
John Keane@jkeaneSDNSep 5
yes: the many benefits and pleasures of reading books are threatened by big-tech oligarchs whose credo is ‘the greatest possible stimulus in the shortest possible interval, with everything algorithmically pureed into intellectual pap.’ @j_amesmarriott @pratinavanil
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Fitzroy Morrissey@fitzmorrisseySep 5
‘Marriott happily advances the heretical proposition that some habits are better than others, and that difficult high culture may actually be good for us.’
Pratinav Anil@pratinavanilSep 5
In praise of reading. I enjoyed @j_amesmarriott's bravura defence of books, theory, and print culture: thetimes.com/culture/books/a…

How to stop the ‘New Dark Ages’: put down your phone and read a book

The Times columnist James Marriott warns of a post-literate future of endless scrolling and digital slop

thetimes.com
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This invigorating review by @pratinavanil of @j_amesmarriott 's polemic, encapsulates with startling & unnerving precision the ubiquitous endemic that is plaguing the contemporary world. We seem to be inhabiting a time where the abnormal is the perfectly acceptable! Splendid!
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Sanjay Sipahimalani@SanSipSep 5
Enjoyed reading @pratinavanil's spirited review of @j_amesmarriott's 'The New Dark Ages: The End of Reading and the Dawn of a Post-Literate Society' in today's London Times.
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In praise of reading. I enjoyed @j_amesmarriott's bravura defence of books, theory, and print culture: thetimes.com/culture/books/a…

How to stop the ‘New Dark Ages’: put down your phone and read a book

The Times columnist James Marriott warns of a post-literate future of endless scrolling and digital slop

thetimes.com
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On the Nepal tragedy - and the class politics of the green transition. My latest for @unherd: unherd.com/2026/09/nepals-cl…

Nepal’s clean energy curse

unherd.com
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Snippet from FT review of “Blood Dawn: World War II and the Making of Modern Asia” by Hans van de Ven: ft.com/content/7d8d5e06-dd13…
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On a brilliant new biography of Puyi, the last emperor of China, whose life it seems was rather less operatically Freudian than Bertolucci’s biopic would have us believe. My latest for @thetimes: thetimes.com/culture/books/a…

Eunuchs and tennis: the true story of the last emperor of China

Paul French’s The Last Emperor of China is a vivid portrayal of the doomed world of Puyi, the last man to sit on the Dragon Throne

thetimes.com
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when I went, I was told the whole point was to be even odder when you came out. Gratia, @pratinavanil thetimes.com/article/edd5b9c…
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David Taylor@djtaylorwriterAug 18
Replying to @pratinavanil
@pratinavanil brilliant on the role of universities in the modern age @times - all the right names mentioned (Theodore Zeldin, Keith Thomas) and the point made that study need not necessarily serve utilitarian ends. Salut!
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I read a rather superfluous account of the Second World War in Asia. My @FT debut: ft.com/content/7d8d5e06-dd13…

Blood Dawn — the second world war and Asia’s imperial wreckage

Hans van de Ven seeks to restore the continent’s place in a western-dominated historical narrative

ft.com
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In defence of universities. My latest column in @thetimes: thetimes.com/comment/columni…
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