Abdulrazak Gurnah’s story of love and betrayal, of seduction and possession, and of people desperately trying to find stability amidst the maelstrom
Paradise
Written by Abdulrazak Gurnah
- Shortlisted
- The Booker Prize 1994
- Published by Hamish Hamilton
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An African boy comes of age in an East Africa increasingly corrupted by colonialism and violence, in Abdulrazak Gurnah’s powerful historical fiction
It soon transpires that the ‘uncle’ young Yusuf is travelling with is in reality a powerful merchant, and he has been pawned to him to pay his father’s debts. Having been sold into slavery by his father, Yusuf is thrown into a multi-ethnic world of war and violence - and the trials of adolescence - in Abdulrazak Gurnah’s rich 20th century odyssey.
Abdulrazak Gurnah
Abdulrazak Gurnah is the author of nine novels. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in October 2021
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