Home
Authors
Tags
App
Get QuoteDark Inspirational Quotes App
" I admire Turgenev, Camus, Proust and Shakespeare, but I've also learnt a lot about writing from composers and artists. "
Hisham Matar
Writing
Artists
Admire
Related Quotes:
" Civil war is a national crisis and also a private trauma: We suffer it collectively and in isolation. "
Hisham Matar
Isolation
War
Suffer
" There is a tendency to over-exaggerate and over-romanticise the place of a writer in a revolution. That bothers me. I think it's inappropriate. "
Hisham Matar
Me
Place
Revolution
" 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
Face
Listening
Me
" To be okay with not knowing is a sign of a mature person and a mature society. "
Hisham Matar
Society
Mature
Person
" 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
Me
Place
Singing
" Being my father's son is a kind of privilege. "
Hisham Matar
Father
Being
Son
" My work is my shelter, particularly in these moments when things are happening fast. "
Hisham Matar
Fast
Happening
Work
" Books have shown me horror and beauty. "
Hisham Matar
Books
Shown
Me
" 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
Men
Father
Country
" 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
Confident
Thought
Myself
" When a dictatorship imprisons someone or makes them disappear, it's actually a very strategic move. We forget that. It's not as senseless as it seems. It's a way to silence someone, but also it's a way to silence their family as well, out of fear, and society by extension. "
Hisham Matar
Fear
Silence
Society
" My best hope is that Libya turns into a peaceful, sensible country that has all the things my father and lots of others have been calling for: independence of the courts and press, a protected and democratic constitution, with different parties involved in a healthy and open debate. "
Hisham Matar
Hope
Best
Debate
" It is easy to underestimate the demands of an open heart. "
Hisham Matar
Easy
Heart
Open
" I've always said - I've always said I'm not, by temperament, a romantic about revolutions or given to revolutions. I've always thought that they are not the ideal way to change. "
Hisham Matar
Change
Thought
Said
" I think my generation's inability to speak in absolute terms when it comes to politics is a very positive thing; it's made us more nuanced, made us more complex. "
Hisham Matar
More
Think
Speak
" One of the dark truths about dictators - and it applies to Gaddafi - is that on some level, they love their people. But it is a strange love. It says, 'I love you for me; I don't love you for you.' That rhymes with a certain kind of Libyan father who was always certain about what was good for those around him. Those fathers lose in the end. "
Hisham Matar
People
Father
Good
" I hope and pray that I'll be one of those fortunate people who have many, many books to write. I don't begrudge writing. I love the whole thing! "
Hisham Matar
Hope
Books
Love
" Gaddafi's ability to have survived so long rests on his convenient position in not being committed to a single ideology and his use of violence in such a theatrical way. "
Hisham Matar
Violence
Way
Single
" 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
Only
Age
Powerful
" Libyans are deeply unsettled by Gaddafi and his regime's careless contempt for human life. The dictatorship is willing to employ any methods necessary to remain in power. "
Hisham Matar
Human
Deeply
Power
" I get a lot of energy from making things up, which is why I feel I'm a novelist. "
Hisham Matar
I Feel
Feel
Why
" My parents were fairly laid-back, but there were certain things about which they were very strict. My brother and I were told never to turn away a person in need. And it didn't matter what we thought of their motives, whether they were truly in need or not. "
Hisham Matar
Brother
Need
Person
" Language is not just a code; you are writing into its history, into its tides. "
Hisham Matar
Just
History
You
" When I was 12 years old, living in Cairo, my parents enrolled me in the American school. Most of the Americans there appeared oddly stifled, determined to remain, if not physically then sentimentally, back in the United States. "
Hisham Matar
Me
Living
American
" My father believed in armed struggle. "
Hisham Matar
Believed
Armed
Father
" We need a father to rage against. "
Hisham Matar
Against
Father
Rage
" From before I was born, we Arabs have been caught between two forces that, seemingly, cannot be defeated: our ruthless dictators, who oppress and humiliate us, and the cynical western powers, who would rather see us ruled by criminals loyal to them than have democratically elected leaders accountable to us. "
Hisham Matar
Loyal
Cynical
Born
" When I'm writing, my mood is very good - and I love life. "
Hisham Matar
Good
Life
Writing
" All great art allows us this: a glimpse across the limits of our self. "
Hisham Matar
Self
Art
Great
" One of the frustrations of prison life, which is also one of its intended consequences, is that the prisoner is made ineffective. He is unable to be of much use. The aim is to render him powerless. "
Hisham Matar
Prison
Consequences
He