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" 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
Related Quotes:
" Being my father's son is a kind of privilege. "
Hisham Matar
Father
Being
Son
" I am longing to see Libya rejoin the world as the internationalist Mediterranean country that it was. "
Hisham Matar
See
Longing
World
" 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. "
Hisham Matar
Hope
Desire
Struggle
" 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
" My parents left Libya in 1979, escaping political repression, and settled in Cairo. I was nine. "
Hisham Matar
Left
Escaping
Parents
" 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
Construction
Am
I Am
" All great art allows us this: a glimpse across the limits of our self. "
Hisham Matar
Self
Art
Great
" 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
" I think, ultimately, I am a sensualist and an aesthete. "
Hisham Matar
Ultimately
I Am
Am
" Ivan Turgenev's novella 'First Love' is one of the most perfect things ever written. "
Hisham Matar
Perfect
Most
Love Is
" Making something of loss is, on some level, satisfying. "
Hisham Matar
Making
Something
Loss
" 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
" Language is not just a code; you are writing into its history, into its tides. "
Hisham Matar
Just
History
You
" One of the reasons why Gadafy's dictatorship has managed to remain in power for so long is not just because it has shown itself to be able to exact a great deal of violence, both psychological and physical, on its people, but because it has been very successful at imposing a narrative, a story. "
Hisham Matar
Great
People
Power
" 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. "
Hisham Matar
You
Space
Unique
" 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
" Political dictatorships take possession not just of money and belongings but of narrative. "
Hisham Matar
Just
Take
Political
" 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. "
Hisham Matar
Imagination
Unity
Future
" 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
Egypt
Silence
Way
" It is evident that Qaddafi is mentally unwell. Like Richard III, he has barricaded himself within lies. "
Hisham Matar
Lies
Like
Within
" Great writing fills me with hopeful enthusiasm and never envy. "
Hisham Matar
Writing
Envy
Great
" 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. "
Hisham Matar
Achievement
Work
Silence
" I ultimately write for myself and the people I love. "
Hisham Matar
Myself
Write
People
" We got rid of Muammar Gaddafi. I never thought I would be able to write these words. "
Hisham Matar
Never
Thought
Write
" I can pinpoint the exact moment when I first began to think about what profession I should go into. It was 1978. I was seven and had just been handed over by the women of my family to the earnest and self-important gatherings of the men. I was no longer the responsibility of my aunts and older female cousins. I was now a man. This was a tragedy. "
Hisham Matar
Men
Moment
Man
" There's always a problem when you write, something you're trying to resolve, and sometimes a view can be inspiring. "
Hisham Matar
Sometimes
Problem
You
" It is easy to underestimate the demands of an open heart. "
Hisham Matar
Easy
Heart
Open
" Nothing we read can import new or foreign feelings that we don't, in one form or another, already possess. "
Hisham Matar
Foreign
Feelings
Nothing