An End to Suffering The Buddha in the World [Paperback]

An End to Sufferingtells of Pankaj Mishra's search to understand the Buddha's relevance in today's world, where religious violence, poverty and terrorism prevail. As he travels among Islamists and the emerging Hindu Muslim class in India, Pakistan, and Afghanistan, Mishra explores the myths and places of the Buddha's life, the West's discovery of Buddhism, and the impact of Buddhist ideas on such modern politicians as Gandhi and Nelson Mandela. Mishra ultimately reaches an enlightenment of his own by discovering the living meaning of the Buddha's teaching, in this unusually discerning, beautifully written, and deeply affecting reflection on Buddhism (Booklist).

Pankaj Mishrawas born in North India in 1969 and now lives in London and India. He is the author ofThe Romantics,winner of theLos Angeles Times's Art Seidenbaum Award for First Fiction, and a frequent contributor toThe New York Review of Books, Granta,and theTimes Literary Supplement.

Part biography, part history, part travel book, part philosophic treatise, [and mainly] intellectual autobiography, [by someone who] 'couldn't sit still' long enough to meditate successfully . . . Mishra's book is in the best tradition of Buddhism, both dispassionate and deeply engaged, complicated and simple, erudite and profoundly humane. The New York Times Book Review

Succinct, lucid, and coherent. Los Angeles Times

[A] journey of self-discovery . . . [Mishra] struggles to reconcile lessons of the Buddha's life with his own shrinking world. The New Yorker

The only sane response to the post-9/11 world. Elle