Living in a place like Pakistan, very often you meet people who are migrating abroad. And sometimes you'll ask their parents, you know - you didn't try to stop them? Like, why didn't you say, don't go - I'll miss you? Stay with me. And, you know, people say, well, it's best for them. They have to go. And parents, you know, take on that sadness because they know it's better for their children if they leave.
Mohsin HamidI responded to the gravity of an invisible moon at my core, and I undertook journeys I had not expected to take.
Mohsin HamidI think writing is a very political act. I think that any writer who says it's not, is simply a writer who is disavowing the political connotations of what they write.
Mohsin HamidIn a world of intrusive technology, we must engage in a kind of struggle if we wish to sustain moments of solitude. E-reading opens the door to distraction. It invites connectivity and clicking and purchasing. The closed network of a printed book, on the other hand, seems to offer greater serenity. It harks back to a pre-jacked-in age. Cloth, paper, ink: For these read helmet, cuirass, shield. They afford a degree of protection and make possible a less intermediated, less fractured experience. They guard our aloneness. That is why I love them, and why I read printed books still.
Mohsin HamidOnly in novels can we take another human being into our head and create something jointly.
Mohsin Hamid