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Héctor Abad | First Sentence
Héctor Abad
‘Ever since this happened to me, I haven’t really believed in free will.’
A Rationalist in the Jungle
Héctor Abad
‘A pale-faced, near-sighted urbanite like me is nothing less than handicapped in the heart of the jungle.’
Road to Chitral
Azhar Abidi
‘I wonder sometimes when this cycle of violence began. When was year zero?’
But Why Write? The Writer-To-Be
Walter Abish
‘How to explain this resolve to write, this firm unwavering intent to become a writer on the part of someone who may not even really care for books?’
The Comrades and I
Mona Abouissa
Mona Abouissa on her experiences with Egyptian communists, and the role they played in Egypt before 1952, when they were excised from official history.
Fork in the Road
Leila Aboulela
‘I left Sudan in 1987 – I was 23 years old and the idea of writing was the furthest thing from my mind.’
Fantastic Mr Fox
Tim Adams
‘He told the police officer that he was a vegan and the next morning a little slit in the prison door opened, with his breakfast: a metal tray on which there were three frozen potatoes.’ Tim Adams on the fox hunting ban in Granta 90: Country Life.
Benjamin Pell Versus the Rest of the World
Tim Adams
‘You hear Benjamin Pell long before you see him.’
In Search of Beauty: Blackness as a Poem in Saudi Arabia
Sulaiman Addonia
Sulaiman Addonia on the slow process of rediscovering the beauty of black skin after moving to Saudi Arabia as a child.
Writing Like Degas Paints
Sulaiman Addonia
Sulaiman Addonia on how Edgar Degas’s nude portraits inspired his latest novel, Silence Is My Mother Tongue.
Operation
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
‘I like to think now that he knew how much I liked him, from the beginning, and that we were both equal participants in the ritual.’