Dreaming and Scheming

In the essay 'The Rainbow Sign', which was first published in 1986 along with the screenplay of My Beautiful Laundrette, Kureishi recounts how, growing up in England, where racists 'weren't discriminating in their racial discrimination', he could understand the motives of 'a black boy who, [having] noticed that burnt skin turned white, jumped into a bath of boiling water'. Then, visiting Pakistan for the first time, Kureishi shook with incomprehension at the notion that he was not considered a foreigner. The collection's title piece is a fascinating account of how Kureishi overcame his 'educational anorexia', how curiosity developed, and how school-teaching could work if only those at the front of the class didn't loathe their pupils.