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" I used to be a keen rider. Sometimes I could sense what a horse liked or preferred to do. "

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" Turgenev's achievement lies in how he succeeded, in spite of himself, his country, and his time, in exempting his work from public duty. This has given it that unnameable quality that makes every sentence true, every silence trustworthy. "

" I am longing to see Libya rejoin the world as the internationalist Mediterranean country that it was. "

" I've never been particularly interested in genre distinctions. They seem to me more useful to a librarian than to a writer. "

" My father, the political dissident Jaballa Matar, disappeared from his home in Cairo in March 1990. "

" I am, by instinct, wary of revolutions. The gathering of the masses fills me with trepidation. "

" As a young boy in Libya, it was hard to escape the conclusion that the women were the most feeling and most functional part of society. "

" 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. "

" Language is not just a code; you are writing into its history, into its tides. "

" Ivan Turgenev's novella 'First Love' is one of the most perfect things ever written. "

" 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. "

" The Qaddafis, father and sons, speak the grammar of dictatorship: threats and bribery. "

" The space where writing happens is a unique space that's hard to define, and when you're kicked out of it because you're travelling or distracted, it seems so elusive and hard to defend because you yourself doubt whether it existed. "

" My father believed in armed struggle. "

" When you've been living in hope for a long time as I have, suddenly you realize that certainty is far more desirable than hope. "

" To be okay with not knowing is a sign of a mature person and a mature society. "

" I've very aware of my rootlessness. "

" My work is my shelter, particularly in these moments when things are happening fast. "

" In the end, madness is worse than injustice, and justice far sweeter than freedom. "

" 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. "

" I don't remember a time when words were not dangerous. "

" I admire Turgenev, Camus, Proust and Shakespeare, but I've also learnt a lot about writing from composers and artists. "

" A revolution is not a painless march to the gates of freedom and justice. It is a struggle between rage and hope, between the temptation to destroy and the desire to build. "

" We have defeated Gaddafi on the battlefield; now we must defeat him in our imagination. We must not allow his legacy to corrupt our dream. Let's keep focused on the true prize: unity, democracy, and the rule of law. Let's not seek revenge; that would diminish our future. "

" Growing up in the Libya of the 1970s, I remember the prevalence of local bands who were as much influenced by Arabic musical traditions as by the Rolling Stones or the Beatles. But the project of 'Arabisation' soon got to them, too, and western musical instruments were declared forbidden as 'instruments of imperialism.' "

" 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. "

" Switching languages is a form of conversion. And like all conversions, whether it's judged a failure or a success, it excites the desire to leave, go elsewhere, adopt a new language and start all over again. It also means that a conscious effort is demanded to remain still. "

" I am terribly interested in the paragraph: the paragraph as an object, the construction, and the possibilities of what a paragraph can do. "

" Like all novelists, I'm interested in the filters between reality and the imagination. "

" Great writing fills me with hopeful enthusiasm and never envy. "

" From my family alone, Qaddafi had imprisoned five men. "