A dazzling tale of cultural identity and displacement, this is the story of a mans escape from his native Zanzibar to England to build a new life By the winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature 2021** He thinks, as he escapes from Zanzibar, that he will probably never return, and yet the dream of studying in England matters above that. Things do not happen quite as he imagined - the school where he teaches is cramped and violent, he forgets how it feels to belong. But there is Emma, beautiful, rebellious Emma, who turns away from her white, middle-class roots to offer him love and bear him a child. And in return he spins stories of his home and keeps her a secret from his family. Twenty years later, when the barriers at last come down in Zanzibar, he is able and compelled to go back. What he discovers there, in a story potent with truth, will change the entire vision of his life. Review I dont think Ive ever read a novel that is so convincingly and hauntingly sad about the loss of home, the impossible longing to belong -- Michele Roberts ? Independent on Sunday Abdulrazak Gurnahs fifth novel, Admiring Silence, is his best to date . There is a wonderful sardonic eloquence to this unnamed narrators voice, and the playful humour and lack of self-pity which characterises his narrative is totally convincing ? Financial Times Through a twisting, many-layered narrative, Admiring Silence explores themes of race and betrayal with bitterly satirical insight ? Sunday Times There is a wonderful sardonic eloquence to this unnamed narrators voice Financial Times I dont think Ive ever read a novel that is so convincingly and hauntingly sad about the loss of home Independent on Sunday
ALOIS NEBEL 
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