Desertion

Desertion

by Abdulrazak Gurnah (Author)

Synopsis

Early one morning in 1899, in a small town along the coast from Mombasa, Hassanali sets out for the mosque. But that morning he never gets there, for out of the desert stumbles an Englishman who collapses at his feet. That man is Martin Pearce - writer, traveller and something of an Orientalist. He is taken to recuperate at the house of a colonial official, Frederick Turner. When he visits Hassanali to thank him for his rescue, he meets his sister Rehana and is immediately fascinated by her beautiful eyes and her air of tragedy. In this crumbling town on the edge of civilised life, with the empire on the brink of a new century, a passionate love affair begins that brings two cultures together and that will reverberate through three generations and across continents. It carries its consequences to Zanzibar in the early 1950s, a country struggling with its complicated legacy of slavery and foreign rule. Here another forbidden love affair begins as Zanzibar moves inexorably towards Independence - and revolution. Through the lives of his characters Abdulrazak Gurnah creates an unforgettable portrait of a continent in upheaval. Ambitious, moving and absorbing, it is a spellbinding novel from a writer at the height of his powers.

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More Information

Format: Hardcover
Pages: 272
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing PLC
Published: 16 May 2005

ISBN 10: 0747577560
ISBN 13: 9780747577560
Book Overview: This will be a major Booker contender - reviews and publicity guaranteed For fans of Ahdaf Soueif's Map of Love; Amitav Ghosh's The Glass Palace and Michael Ondaatje's The English Patient. 'Gurnah has some of the sharpness and clarity of VS Naipaul and more than a dash of Ben Okri's measured poetic diction.' - New Statesman

Media Reviews
'Rarely in a lifetime can you open a book and find that reading it encapsulates the qualities of a love affair.' The Times on 'By The Sea' 'Achingly good...urbane, graceful and wholly captivating.' Sunday Telegraph on 'By The Sea' 'Gurnah is a compelling storyteller and Admiring Silence exercises a mnemonic hold on the reader.' Russell Celyn Jones on 'Admiring Silence' 'What a beautiful, strange book...What an interesting writer and what a compelling, pitiless, dazzling world he knows.' Jane Gardam on 'Paradise'
Author Bio
Abdulrazak Gurnah was born in 1948 in Zanzibar and teaches at the University of Kent. He is the author of six novels which include Paradise, Admiring Silence and By the Sea. Paradise was shortlisted for both the Booker and the Whitbread Prizes. By The Sea was longlisted for the Booker Prize,shortlisted for the Los Angeles Times Book Award and won the Radio France International 'Temoin du Monde' Prize.