Mohsin Hamid

Mohsin Hamid
Occupation	Novelist
Nationality	Pakistan, United Kingdom
Period	2000-present
Website
http://www.mohsinhamid.com

Mohsin Hamid (born 1971) is a Pakistani British author.

Biography

Hamid spent part of his childhood in the United States, where he stayed from the age of 3 to 9 while his father was enrolled in a PhD program at Stanford University. He then moved with his family back to Lahore, Pakistan. He moved to the United States to obtain his education. He graduated from Princeton University summa cum laude in 1993, having studied under such writers as Joyce Carol Oates and Toni Morrison. He then attended Harvard Law School, graduating in 1997. Finding the law boring, he then worked for several years as a management consultant at McKinsey & Company in New York City before moving back to Pakistan and working as a freelance journalist in Lahore. He now lives in London, where he works part-time as a consultant. Since 2006 he has held both British and Pakistani citizenship.

Work

Hamid's first novel, Moth Smoke was published in 2000 by Farrar, Straus and Giroux in the US, Granta in the UK, and worldwide in 10 languages. It won a Betty Trask Award, was a finalist for the PEN/Hemingway Award, and was a New York Times Notable Book of the Year. It was also adapted for television in Pakistan and as an operetta in Italy.

His second novel, The Reluctant Fundamentalist, was published in 2007 by Hamish Hamilton in the UK, Harcourt in the US, and worldwide in 20 languages. It was shortlisted for the Booker Prize. A short story based on the novel, called "Focus on the Fundamentals", was published in the Fall 2006 issue of the Paris Review. In an interview in May 2007, he said of the brevity of The Reluctant Fundamentalist: "I’d rather people read my book twice than only half-way through."

His journalism and essays have appeared in Time, The New York Times, The Independent, The Washington Post, and other publications.

Novels

• Moth Smoke (2000) ISBN 0374213542
• The Reluctant Fundamentalist (2007) ISBN 0241143659

Honors

• 2000 New York Times Notable Book of the Year: Moth Smoke
• 2001 Betty Trask Award: Moth Smoke
• 2001 Hemingway Foundation/PEN Award (shortlist): Moth Smoke
• 2007 Man Booker Prize for Fiction (shortlist): The Reluctant Fundamentalist
• 2007 New York Times Notable Book of the Year: The Reluctant Fundamentalist
• 2008 Anisfield-Wolf Book Award: The Reluctant Fundamentalist
• 2008 Arts Council England Decibel Award (shortlist): The Reluctant Fundamentalist
• 2008 Commonwealth Writers Prize (Eurasia Region, Best Book) (shortlist): The Reluctant Fundamentalist
• 2008 Index on Censorship T R Fyvel Award (shortlist): The Reluctant Fundamentalist
• 2008 James Tait Black Memorial Prize (for fiction) (shortlist): The Reluctant Fundamentalist
• 2008 South Bank Show Annual Award for Literature: The Reluctant Fundamentalist

References

• "Akhil and Mohsin Get Paid", New York Observer, April 23, 2001
• Bucha, S.: "The Bold and the Beautiful", Newsline, July 2002
• Contemporarywriters.com entry on Mohsin Hamid Accessed May 12, 2008
• Hamid, M.: "Race Special: Mohsin Hamid on Citizenship", The Independent, February 25, 2007
• Hamid, M.: "Focus on the Fundamentals", Paris Review, Issue 178, Fall 2006
• http://www.spaghettitaliani.com/Articoli/ArticoloAS.htm Accessed March 4, 2007
• Houpt, S.: "Novelist by Night", The Globe and Mail, April 1, 2000
• Patel, V.: "A Call to Arms for Pakistan", Newsweek, July 24, 2000
• Rice, L.: "A Novel Idea", Harvard Law Bulletin, Summer 2000

External links

• Mohsin Hamid's website
• Granta
• Mohsin Hamid at Holtzbrinck
• Mohsin Hamid at Penguin

Articles & Interviews

• Mohsin Hamid in EGO Magazine
• A long conversation with Mohsin Hamid
• Mohsin Hamid on citizenship in The Independent