Culture

I started writing fiction because I was lonely. I was an only child, a solitary child, raised by a single working mother, which was very unusual at the time in Turkey. Literature gave me a sense of continuity, coherence; it kept my pieces together. It helped me to connect even when I felt like I didn't quite belong.

Turkish-British novelist and author of "The Forty Rules of Love

In reality, India is not as divided as you might think… hundreds of millions of Muslims live and work in India, they are friends with people in and out of their community, and just live normal lives like anyone else.

Indian Author & Novelist Known for Best-Selling Fiction Books

India is conservative on the outside, but becoming more liberal inside. A lot of my stories are about the double life that younger India has to lead…. The conflict between conservatism and liberal values.

Indian Author & Novelist Known for Best-Selling Fiction Books

Human beings are naturally liberal about these things, human beings are naturally in pursuit of wealth and in pursuit of love and in pursuit of pleasure. I think that happens more in the West or in developed places because it's more accepted there.

Indian Author & Novelist Known for Best-Selling Fiction Books

My work depends on knowing real India, not the 'exotic' stereotype.

Indian Author & Novelist Known for Best-Selling Fiction Books

I noticed trolling because I was a troll when I was a teenager. I was one of those guys who spent a lot of time on forums at the weekend – trolling people. Back then, it was more like pranking; sending people a dud-link that would send them to a weird cartoon or porn site.

Women were never in the driver's seat with dating. It always came down to the man to take the lead, to ask the girl... There was this playbook where the guy has the power, the girl is weak and fragile waiting to be saved by Prince Charming... and this is disempowering for both sides.

Founder and CEO of dating app Bumble, feminist entrepreneur

Comedy delivers the cerebral and the hyperbole, it can be funny and serious. You can see that ability for the pendulum to swing both ways when you watch the best comedians perform.

Comedian and former Daily Show correspondent known for Netflix special "Patriot Act

Comedy chips at people in power, particularly those who use tyrannical power. It strips their fake respect, and destroys the fake fear they create; and these are people who rely on being respected, and being feared.

Egyptian comedian and political satirist known for "The Daily Show" parody

The team was a meritocracy in which performance alone was rewarded. As I got better and my team started winning championships for my school, my status as freakishly tall black kid became a badge of accomplishment and inclusion.

NBA's All-Time Leading Scorer & Six-Time Champion

Growing up in Pakistan, I saw so many people with heart disease and having heart attacks – it felt almost biblical – it was catastrophic. Unlike a lot of diseases, there wasn't much a cultural footprint for heart disease – it's not something you hear about on news or TV shows.

Cardiologist and author specializing in heart disease and public health

Even if there's no profound cultural difference between brown, black and white Britons… they speak the same language, eat the same food, abstain from going to the same churches… identity culture assigns significance to their bodily differences, and so race exists.

Philosopher, Cosmopolitanism Advocate & Princeton University Professor

Our entire civilisation is a manifestation of the complex inner worlds we carry with us. Everything around us, our buildings, cultures, politics, economies, statues, art and music are reflections of who we were, are and want to be.

Founder of Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) program

For thousands of years, the religions, movements and philosophers of the various iterations of 'us' have espoused mindfulness as being an essential life-skill, bringing us from wherever we may be to the here and now- where we are at our most alive.

Founder of Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) program

The role of a chef today is not just to feed people, but to be a storyteller, an educator, a guardian of traditions while pushing boundaries.

Acclaimed Indian Chef, Author & Michelin-Starred Restaurant Owner

Food is not just sustenance. It's memory, it's culture, it's identity. When I cook, I'm telling the story of my grandmother, my mother, the streets of Amritsar where I grew up.

Acclaimed Indian Chef, Author & Michelin-Starred Restaurant Owner