Saturday Feeling: Mario Miranda at 100, Shelby Van Pelt on Marcellus, a Raghu Rai tribute and more weekend reading

In the cliched, touristy images of boisterousness found on walls and coasters promoting Goa, the details of Mario Miranda’s art are often missed. And the pretenders are many, but the Goan cartoonist, artist and illustrator, who would have turned 100 today, remains the state’s best-loved and most insightful chronicler and cultural commentator. Mario didn’t take his art too seriously though he pursued it with seriousness and produced piles of it in his lifetime, as Arun Janardhan reports for Lounge in our story to mark Mario Miranda’s birth centenary. He is usually celebrated as a cartoonist who epitomised Goa’s sangfroid, and that often hides the layers—the elaborate cross-hatching that captured various moods, whether melancholy, raucous or lovelorn, and his insights into everyday insecurities and struggles as well as the strangeness of his fellow human beings. He might not have set out to do it, but Mario demonstrated that there’s no such thing as “high” and “pop” art—his work can be seen as a form of meta criticism or just plain fun, depending on the perspective you bring to it.

Unusual perspectives tie together many of the stories we did in Lounge this past week. Shelby Van Pelt, author of the gentle, almost too-sweet book about independence and mortality, Remarkably Bright Creatures, tells Somak Ghoshal how she ended up making a grumpy giant Pacific octopus the protagonist of her 2022 book (easily one of the best I read last year). The book has been made into a film which will reach screens next week.

We also have a tribute to Raghu Rai, the legendary photographer who died earlier this week, whose work—whether life on the street, portraits of the famous, tragedy, politics or culture—brought us a different kind of intense engagement with the world and have now become a visual record of contemporary India.

Why is everyone queuing for benne dosa?

From Mumbai and Delhi to Kolkata and Lucknow, the buttery ‘benne dose’ is all the rage and has travelled far beyond its hometown of Davangere in Karnataka to find a new fanbase. Benne in Kannada means butter, and that, more than anything else defines a good benne dosa (or dose). It is also being reimagined as tacos and paired with chicken ghee roast. Rituparna Roy tries to work out why everyone is queuing for benne dosa.

How to spend the weekend

Mango season is here, and though the simplest, most delicious way to eat a mango is skinned and sliced, chefs and mixologists are bringing their own signatures to it. Get the most of your favourite mango on a plate in all sorts of inventive forms—from Alphonso smoked chicken and mango pizza to ‘aamras’ cheesecake and ‘aam panna’ picante. Food aside, weekends are also the best time to catch up on shows and films and we have a selection of what to watch this weekend, from The Devil wears Prada again to Suvinder Vicky in a boxing thriller.

All about the tech powering luxury cars

Germany’s Big Three—Mercedes-Benz, BMW and Audi—have always offered the most sophisticated tech packages in luxury cars. But all three luxury automobile makers rolling our cars with similar specs in 2026, deciding which one to pick and what differentiates them has become tough, writes Shouvik Das. There’s no doubt that technology will play a role in giving passengers entertainment options, and this will differentiate such vehicles from the functional features ubiquitous even in sub-luxury cars.

LinkedIn’s Aneesh Raman on the future of work

The workplace is no longer interested in just your resume and where you went to school. What really counts in this era of Artificial Intelligence is what you can bring and build for the company as an individual. LinkedIn’s Aneesh Raman, one of the co-authors of the new book Open to Work, speaks to Somak Ghoshal about the AI and the future of work, saying that AI has put tools once reserved for those with resources and connections in the hands of everyone, and that is opening doors for more people.

Why Shakespeare still draws tourists

One of the earliest celebrations of William Shakespeare was held in 1769 in the playwright’s birthplace, Stratford-upon-Avon. Back then, London-based actor David Garrick organized the jubilee, a three-day event that ended up being a wash-out. Too many people crowded the town that didn’t have hotels or inns, rain poured down, and the streets were flooded. The tradition, however, continued. Uttaran Das Gupta visited the town for the jubilee and explains why a trip to Shakespeare’s homes in Stratford-upon-Avon is an essential pilgrimage.

‘Michael’ review: A soulless exercise

There have been few genres more dispiriting in recent years than the Hollywood musical biopic. Michael is the latest to join them, recreating key moments from the pop star’s life without bringing any insight to him or his music. The Jackson estate, producers, director Antoine Fuqua and writer John Logan have taken a gamble that viewers, and fans especially, don’t believe or don’t care about the many allegations of molestation and grooming levied against Jackson—and it’s paid off as the film has broken records abroad. They have fashioned a film in which these matters don’t surface, where Jackson is a saint, and where his only underage companion is a chimpanzee, writes Uday Bhatia.