02|05|2025

Sadly, today is my last day at Jap Sam Books. This made choosing a final book especially difficult. A Fair Share of Utopia by Nest, stands out from the other books I’ve covered, as most of its pages are devoted to essays by 11 writers, while only about 10 full spreads feature artwork by as many artists. All these contributions, commissioned and collected by Manon Braat, were prompted by Michelle Alexander’s New York Times column "What if We’re All Coming Back?".

Each contributor responds to the question: How would you shape the world now if you knew you’d be reincarnated into a random life after you die?

I found this question especially compelling: First, I think most of us have considered something similar. Just last winter, I asked my family my favourite “would you rather” during a hike: would you rather be reborn in the Middle Ages, but get to choose your social position, or a hundred years in the future with no control over who or where you’ll be? A heated debate followed – I argued for the Middle Ages, while my mom and stepdad bet on the future. The intensity we felt probably comes from the same curiosity that drew Braat to Alexander’s column – a curiosity about other lives, unknown futures, and the randomness of birth.

Beyond the universality of its core question, I liked this book, because it challenges us to reimagine society by expanding our sense of self-interest to include all people. This is not only companionate, but also very practical. As Sisonke Msimang, Jan van de Venis, and several others pointed out in their essays, it’s often difficult for those who have always been fortunate to imagine that their lives could be any different, which has changed in recent decades, as a series of ‘unprecedented’ global events have disrupted even the most seemingly stable lives. My generation is coming of age in a time when even the luckiest cannot escape pandemics, fires, floods, authoritarian regimes, and housing crises. “What if I had a different life” is not a hypothetical. It's far past time that we considered we might not have to wait for death to experience a kind of reincarnation.

I hope you enjoyed Moments,
Jasmine

A Fair Share of Utopia by Nest, released in 2021. Book design by Michiel Niesen (ZetProducties), cover design by Soft Turbo. 

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