Contents
Abdulrazak Gurnah
Writing novels about colonialism, displacement and the lives of people caught between cultures.
Paradise · By the Sea
- Born
- 1948
- Birthplace
- Zanzibar, Tanzania
More people
Abdulrazak Gurnah
Abdulrazak Gurnah is a Zanzibar-born British novelist and literary scholar. He received the 2021 Nobel Prize in Literature.
Early life
Zanzibar childhood
Grew up speaking Swahili in Zanzibar, before the upheaval surrounding the 1964 revolution.
Arrival in Britain
Left as a young man and later studied at the University of Kent, completing a doctorate in 1982.
Career
- 1980s
Teaching and writing
Taught in Nigeria and later at Kent while developing his fiction.
- 1987
First novel
Published Memory of Departure, beginning a sustained exploration of migration and belonging.
- 1994
Wider recognition
Paradise was shortlisted for the Booker Prize.
- 2021
Literature Nobel
Received the prize for a body of work exploring colonialism and the refugee experience.
Selected books
Paradise
Followed a young man in East Africa before the First World War.
By the Sea
Brought together two men from Zanzibar seeking lives in England.
Afterlives
Explored the effects of German colonial rule in East Africa.
Beyond writing
Literary scholarship
Taught and wrote about postcolonial literature alongside his own novels.
Writing in English
Uses English for his fiction while drawing on the languages, places and histories of his upbringing.
Sources & photo credit
Life, career and references ↗Nobel Prize biography and award ↗Photo: flowcomm. CC BY 2.0 · Original image. Cropped and displayed in monochrome.
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