Synopses & Reviews
Synopsis
This is the first biography of Hanif Kureishi, one of the most provocative, versatile and popular British writers of his generation. Drawing on Kureishi's unexplored personal archive, recently acquired by the British Library, each chapter recounts a decade of his life and illuminates the work he produced within the period. This structure reflects the novelist's own preoccupation with self-reinvention and the fluidity of identity: 'Every decade you become someone else.' With his vivid evocations of marginalised subjects, Kureishi has redefined images of British identity. At the same time, he has explored key issues such as Thatcherism, terrorism, race, class and sexuality. Entering his mid-sixties, he is only beginning to reflect on a lifetime's cultural production that includes award-winning screenplays, novels, plays, essays and short-stories, written between the early eighties and the first decades of the twenty-first century.
Synopsis
From the global successes of My Beautiful Laundrette and The Buddha of Suburbia, through to late masterpieces such as The Nothing, Hanif Kureishi is one of Britain's most popular and versatile writers.
Drawing on Kureishi's unexplored personal archive, recently acquired by the British Library, each chapter in Ruvani Ranashina's jaw-droppingly honest biography recounts a decade of the author's life, illuminating the work he produced in each period. This structure reflects the novelist and screenwriter's own preoccupation with self-reinvention and the fluidity of identity: 'Every decade you become someone else'.
Kureishi has redefined British identity, exploring key issues such as Thatcherism, terrorism, race, class, and sexuality. Hanif Kureishi - Writing the self: A biography is a tour-de-force, exploring for the first time this provocative artist. Looking at his novels, including Intimacy and the Black Album, short stories, and screenplays - the Mother and Venus, and his collaborations with such figures as David Bowie, Roger Michell and Stephen Frears, Ranashini analyses this sometime controversial figure with wit and empathy.
Synopsis
Original, bold and always funny, Hanif Kureishi is one of Britain's most popular, provocative and versatile writers.
Born in Bromley in 1954 to an Indian father and white British mother, Kureishi's life is intimately bound up with the history of immigration and social change in Britain. This is the story of how a mixed-raced child of empire who attended the local comprehensive school found success with a remarkable series of novels and screenplays, including My Beautiful Laundrette and The Buddha of Suburbia, Intimacy, Venus and Le Week-End. The book also illuminates a larger story, not only of the artist as a young man, but of the recasting of Britain in the aftermath of decolonisation.
Drawing on journals, letters and manuscripts from Kureishi's unexplored archive, recently acquired by the British Library, and informed by interviews with his family, friends and collaborators, as well with the writer himself, Ruvani Ranasinha sheds new light on how his life animates his work. This first biography offers a vivid portrait of a major talent who has inspired a new generation of writers.
Synopsis
The first biography of Hanif Kureishi, based on his newly available personal archive.