To me, writing is like singing in the most inappropriate place, singing as beautifully as you can on a bus or in a bank, where people least expect it, and trying to get them to want to listen. Hisham Matar Read Quote
I am terribly interested in the paragraph: the paragraph as an object, the construction, and the possibilities of what a paragraph can do. Hisham Matar Read Quote
I’ve never thought of myself in terms of an identity. I’m always baffled when I encounter someone who gives the impression about being confident about a particular defined identity. Hisham Matar Read Quote
Over the centuries, close-knit tribes have played an important part in the cohesion of Libyan society. Hisham Matar Read Quote
My parents left Libya in 1979, escaping political repression, and settled in Cairo. I was nine. Hisham Matar Read Quote
In 2006, I published my first novel, ‘In the Country of Men.’ The publication of the book gave me a bigger platform to speak about my father’s abduction and Libya’s human-rights record. Hisham Matar Read Quote
In the same way that Egypt and Libya conspired to ‘disappear’ my father and silence writers such as Idris Ali, they made me, too, to a far lesser extent, feel punished for speaking out. Hisham Matar Read Quote
The Arab Spring is a powerful and compelling response not only to an age of tyranny but also to the remnant chains of imperial influence. Hisham Matar Read Quote
My earliest memory of books is not of reading but of being read to. I spent hours listening, watching the face of the person reading aloud to me. Hisham Matar Read Quote
