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" There are two voices: the first says write; the second hardly speaks, but I know what he wants. And if I let him, nothing would get done. He hovers at the edges. "

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" Some of the most powerful memories are those when you are very, very young. Adult life is seen through the reflection of complex, rational thought. "

Hisham Matar

Life

Powerful

Reflection

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

" I sometimes wonder if I would have become a writer if what happened to my father hadn't happened. "

" 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. "

" There's always a problem when you write, something you're trying to resolve, and sometimes a view can be inspiring. "

" Dreams have consequences. "

Hisham Matar

Dreams

Consequences

" 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! "

" 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. "

" Like most dictators, Col Gaddafi detests the metropolis. His vision of Libya is a kind of Bedouin romantic medievalism, suspicious of universities, theatres, galleries and cafes, and so monitors the cities' inhabitants with paranoid suspicion. "

" 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. "

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

" When I'm writing, my mood is very good - and I love life. "

" The cost of Colonel Gaddafi's rule on Libyan society is incalculable. "

" The romantic idea of the penniless writer is false. It's terrible. I hated being in debt. I hated the anxiety of not knowing whether we could pay our rent that month. Thankfully, I had a wife who was very supportive and had faith and shared my madness. "

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

" 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. "

" Making something of loss is, on some level, satisfying. "

" My father believed in armed struggle. "

" 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. "

" All great art allows us this: a glimpse across the limits of our self. "

" There's something very bizarre about having a father who has disappeared. It's very hard to articulate. "

" 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. "

" We got rid of Muammar Gaddafi. I never thought I would be able to write these words. "

" 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

Place

Singing

" 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. "

" Throughout my entire life, I have lived in the shadow of the dictatorship. It denied me safety and security. "

" My parents left Libya in 1979, escaping political repression, and settled in Cairo. I was nine. "

" Civil war is a national crisis and also a private trauma: We suffer it collectively and in isolation. "

" 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