“I don't believe people are interested in dates and facts. I don't think it is interesting to say what it is to be this person or that, but I do believe it is entertaining and perhaps even of value to express how it is to be that person.”

American-born British-Libyan novelist, essayist, and memoirist

Hisham Matar is an American-born British-Libyan novelist, essayist, and memoirist. He is known for writing about exile, loss, family, and political violence, often through work shaped by his own experience of displacement. His debut novel, In the Country of Men, was shortlisted for the 2006 Man Booker Prize. His memoir The Return, which follows the search for his father, won the 2017 Pulitzer Prize for Biography or Autobiography and several other awards. His essays have appeared in The New Yorker, The Guardian, The New York Times, and elsewhere, and he has written several other novels.