In Surviving the 21st Century by Noam Chomsky and José Mujica, with Saúl Alvídrez (Verso), documentary filmmaker Alvídrez brings together Mujica, former President of Uruguay, and 96-year-old Chomsky, a professor renowned as “the father of modern linguistics”, to debate the major global issues amid the “chaos” of our time. The book is hugely thought-provoking and profoundly depressing. As Chomsky says: “Young people today are faced with the question of whether the species can survive in any decent way, and that is a very real question.” His overriding message, one so necessary in this derivative world, is “think for yourself!”
The annual literary festival at Hay-on-Wye is a great cultural event of the year, and one of the key figures behind its founding and subsequent success is given his due in James Hanning’s charming biography The Bookseller of Hay: The Life and Times of Richard Booth (Corsair). The book neatly captures a bygone age of eccentricity.
