Chitra Ramaswamy

A salve, as always, @kathleenjamie.bsky.social

Two people stand smiling on stage at the Scottish Press Awards 2025. The woman on the left holds a glass award. Behind them is a large backdrop featuring the event branding. The tweet announces that the winner of Podcast of the Year is @FerretScot for ‘A Place to Heal’, with @RachaelRevesz as runner-up for ‘Coatbridge; The Disappearance of Moira Anderson’.

We are thrilled to have won the Podcast of the Year award at the Scottish Press Awards. Huge congratulations to our co-editor, @karingoodwin.bsky.social!

Still some places left folks! Come!

This is happening next month and there are a few places left! If you can, JOIN US! Please share.

Residential Writing Course: The Essay | One form, infinite possibilities | Arvon What constitutes an essay, and why write one? Are there limits to what this ancient form can do, where it can go, or what it might contain? How do we know when an essay is done and how we might go abo...

This May, spend a week in Devon exploring essays—a form with limitless possibilities. Tutored by prizewinning journalist, essayist and non-fiction writer @chitgrrl.bsky.social, writer and publisher Will Rees, plus special guest @briangdillon.bsky.social. More info: www.arvon.org/writing-cour...

Loved doing this.

Ruvani Ranasinha & Mohammed Hanif in conversation with Chitra Ramaswamy WritersMosaic - In conversation · Episode

Loved chairing and participating in this discussion of the great Hanif Kureishi with his official biographer @ruvaniranasinha.bsky.social and Mohammed Hanif for @writersmosaic.bsky.social introduced by @colincraiggrant.bsky.social listen here: open.spotify.com/episode/75lx...

This is happening next month and there are a few places left! If you can, JOIN US! Please share.

Also:
@palebackwriter.bsky.social on Ukraine
@gordonbuchan.bsky.social on his love of Scotland
Selali Flamanya on wild swimming in Scotland
@chitgrrl.bsky.social on the Real Food Cafe
Michelin-starred Stuart Ralston’s sesame roast recipe
And more…

Donald Trump is turning America into a mafia state | Jonathan Freedland The pattern is inescapable – with just one caveat: organised crime bosses occasionally display more honour, says Guardian columnist Jonathan Freedland

www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

With Love, Meghan review – toe-curlingly unlovable TV The Duchess of Sussex’s tone-deaf lifestyle show vibrates with vacuous joylessness – and is packed with useless information that will take a long, long time to remove from your head

Because you clearly haven't read enough about it yet... my @theguardian.com review of With Love, Megan www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio...

Silver winter light in the northern corries of the Cairngorms yesterday. And look at that fabulous expanse of pine forest lapping the feet of the big hills. Pulls my heart northwards…

(Images by my parents, who were up in Coire an Lochan)

The word “spat” is a kind of gaslighting. We all saw what it was.

The Freelance Writing Jobs New Directions Bursary Announcing a new writing opportunity.

Fancy a stay at the gorgeous Gladstone's Library to work on a new writing project? You've got until Friday to apply for the Freelance Writing Jobs bursary. freelancewritingjobs.substack.com/p/the-freela...

Thank you so much.

Thank you so much.

Ah, thank you so much Rachel.

Thank you.

Ah, thank you dear Anna.

BBC News on hour reporting straight that Trump has got rid of military chiefs because ‘they’re too mired in woke culture’ 🤯🤯🤯

Traditional liberal democratic media still hasn’t learned how to report on authoritarians, even now when it’s almost too late

I don’t like saying this but BBC News is utterly failing in its coverage of Trump. Go elsewhere to find out what is actually happening

Aw thanks Sam.

Thank you Harriet!

Was delighted to do this interview with the maverick Jonathan Nunn in his equally maverick @vittles.bsky.social about my life and work as the restaurant critic for the Scotland edition of @thetimes.com

Ah, thank you!

Dani Garavelli · Jailed, Failed, Forgotten: Deaths in Custody William had spent most of his life in the care of the state. His story was one of intergenerational trauma, common to...

"It would have taken little money/effort to remove bunk beds from single occupancy cells, & doorstops could have been replaced with anti-suicide alternatives.The bunk beds & doorstops were still in Polmont when the FAI began 6 years later." Last punt of my LRB longread. www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4...

Amandaland review – a rare chance to laugh so hard you wee yourself The worst Motherland mother of all gets her own spin-off – and the gag rate is so high it fizzes with the hysterical energy of perimenopause. It’s good to be back in hell

My @theguardian.com TV review of the excellent Motherland spin off Amandaland is up. Highly approve of the headline... www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio...

"waitrose finest Cornish mature vintage cheddar" is an anagram of "rev, the stationer's wife charmed a dancing suitor"

A bird's-eye view of a former Auschwitz II-Birkenau camp showing a wide dirt pathway flanked by parallel rows of barbed-wire fences. Groups of visitors walk along the path, surrounded by the remnants of brick structures and barracks, now reduced to foundations. Green grass contrasts with the somber history of the site, as the path leads toward a guard tower in the distance.

Auschwitz was at the end of a long process. It did not start from gas chambers.

This hatred was gradually developed by humans. From ideas, words, stereotypes & prejudice through legal exclusion, dehumanization & escalating violence... to systematic and industrial murder.

Auschwitz took time.

Thinking today, and every day, of my dear friends Henry and Ingrid Wuga. Holocaust survivors. Kindertransportees. German Jewish refugees. Magnificent humans. The subjects of my last book. My friends. #holocaustmemorialday