Abdulrazak Gurnah: "Integration means forgetting where you come from, and that's impossible."

BarcelonaWhile the winner of this year's Nobel Prize in Literature was announced on Thursday, László Krasznahorkai, another award winner, Abdulrazak Gurnah, spoke to journalists from a hotel in Barcelona to talk about his new novel, A long road (Salamander). Gurnah, who was born in Zanzibar in 1948 and has lived in London for over 40 years, was awarded the prize in 2021. The jury valued his work because it takes a "rigorous and moving approach to the effects of colonialism and the fate of refugees at the intersection of cultures and continents." A long road, the first novel he's published since being chosen by the Swedish Academy in 2021, tells of the friendship between three young people in 1990s Zanzibar who, from very different backgrounds, try to escape.

In this novel, he returns to the landscape of his childhood, but not in the 1950s but in the 1990s. Why this period in particular?

— Yes, it's not a return to my childhood, but rather an attempt to imagine a childhood in another time. That's the work of a writer: to imagine, to enter another time. The pressures were different in the 1990s. I grew up before the revolution, for example. It was a very different place; many people were expelled after the revolution. The questions to answer would have been different.

And what interested you about that period? What questions did you want to ask?

— In part, the origin of the novel is a childhood memory. I knew a boy who worked as a servant in a nearby nursing home, and we became friends. At the time, I didn't fully understand it, but it was clear that I had a path ahead of me; I could go to school, I liked it, and I could advance. He didn't have the same opportunities. Then he was accused of theft, fired, and scorned. And this stayed with me for many years. It wasn't an obsession, but I thought about it. And one of the beautiful things about being a writer is that, when something is on your mind, there comes a time when you can write about what might have happened. I don't place it in my childhood because if I had, the revolution would have completely affected the situation. I wanted to imagine how this boy coped with what he had experienced.

Karim, Fauzia, and Badar are three young people who grew up in very different environments and must find their own paths. The book explores the consequences of the choices we make throughout our lives.

— Yes, exactly. And at a certain point, all three are innocent. When I say innocent, I don't mean naive. I mean none of the three have done anything out of shame or guilt. But as they move forward, they have to make decisions, and some reveal who they really are. Or show how they've let themselves be seduced and perhaps ended up not making the best decision. This is the case with Karim.

Do you think there are right and wrong decisions?

— You said right or wrong, but I wouldn't use those words. I prefer to think that decisions should be made with integrity: taking into account the feelings of others, but also their own desires. So I would say Karim is self-indulgent. Fauzia, on the other hand, isn't entirely selfish, but she does think about others. And I think I prefer her.

Karim's mother leaves her husband because he mistreats her, and leaves her son with his maternal grandparents. She seeks her own happiness. Is this a choice that would not have been possible in another historical period?

— I think it would have been possible before, too. It's not uncommon, and I suspect it's not uncommon in other countries either, for young mothers to end up leaving their child with grandparents. Some grandparents are delighted. In fact, it's less likely now, because there are daycare centers. But it's still a big decision, because the mother is leaving the country. You could say it's a kind of abandonment. But then there's an older brother to take care of Karim. It's not like Badar, who has no one.

El Badar works at a luxury hotel. Are you critical of the growing tourism in your home country?

— Many hotels have been built on land that once held family homes. The state seized them and then gave them to other people, and eventually foreign capital came in. This is what I was interested in showing. But I didn't want to criticize tourism so much as show its impact. Tourists go everywhere—I'm a tourist myself, sometimes—but in places like Zanzibar, the power imbalance is enormous. Tourists can do whatever they want and leave without consequences. What they leave behind is what I was interested in exploring.

In this regard, there is a moment when Karim tells Badar that he is submissive.

— Yes, he says, "Now I take my life in my hands." He says he's learned not to be afraid, which is clearly a fantasy, because perhaps it would be better to be. He thinks he's now in control of his life, and that Badar, because of his fearful attitude, will never do anything for himself. Badar doesn't verbalize it, but he thinks he's learned to resist.

When you received the Nobel Prize, you said that writing was a pleasure for you. Is that still the case? Do you write more calmly now, or with more anguish?

— Writing is a pleasure, yes. However, serenity has come over the years, as you feel more confident and less worried about how the text will sound or how it will work. You know your strengths, you have editors and readers to advise you. The Nobel Prize is a kind of confirmation that tells you: "You're doing well, you write well."

And this makes everything easier?

— Of course. Every writer wants their work to reach more readers, in different languages, all over the world.

I think in a debate you said that people expect too much, that they think you're a wise man who has answers for everything, and you're a writer.

— I've never spoken on behalf of anyone. What I write is what I think. I don't represent anyone. And I'll continue to do so.

In your Nobel Prize-winning speech, you said you started writing when you arrived in London to explain things others wanted to erase. There are governments, especially authoritarian ones, that want to impose their own narrative. We have Trump and Netanyahu. To what extent can literature be a resistance to these narratives?

— All citizens have the responsibility to speak out when injustices exist. All of us. And those of us with a platform—journalists, writers, professors—even more so. But writing literature in a way that's too direct, saying "this is an injustice, do something," isn't always productive. This is pamphlet-making, not literature. If I wanted to read this, I'd read a newspaper or listen to a speech. In literature, I look for something else: complexity, pleasure, reflection. It can influence the way I want to live, but I want to get there myself.

You moved to London at a very young age. There's a lot of talk about migration, and many terms are used: exile, refugee, and even integration. What does it mean to you? integrationDoesn't it also imply disintegration, because in order to adapt, you lose things from your place of origin?

— Yes, it's complicated. But these words—integration, assimilation—are often used coercively: "Come here and become someone we can live with." This is impossible. It's a demand doomed to failure: you'll never be enough like them. In reality, most people who live as foreigners learn to contribute to the place they live, but where they come from also matters. It can be seen as a tragedy, especially if you've come because of violence or war, but also as something beautiful: you bring a different perspective, you transform the place you arrive to. "Integrating" means forgetting this, and that's not possible.

Returning to the importance of words: what's happening in Gaza. Many people say it's a genocide. How would you define that term?

— There are legal definitions, and I won't add anything. But what we see is an endless slaughter, for no apparent reason beyond a kind of madness, an impossible fantasy to depopulate a place. The urgent thing is to force them to stop. So many things have already been destroyed, it's hard to imagine.