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FiveBooks Interviews
Hugh Thomson is an explorer, film-maker and writer who believes the world is not as thoroughly explored as we like to believe. His most recent book is Tequila Oil: Getting Lost in Mexico, now available in paperback.
May Witwit is an Iraqi who is now living in the UK. She was forced to flee Baghdad when her life became too dangerous – leaving her job as a university lecturer in literature behind her. She has recently published a book about how she managed to escape Iraq with the help of a gutsy BBC journalist.
Dan Choi, graduate of West Point Military Academy, fluent Arabic speaker and Iraq war veteran, was ordered out of the US military last year after publicly announcing his homosexuality in a direct challenge to the army’s controversial ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ policy. Yesterday the Pentagon took the first step towards ending the federal ban on gays serving in the military.
James Meek spent several years in Russia in the 1990s and now lives in London. He has published four novels and two short story collections. In 2004 he was named Foreign Correspondent and Amnesty Journalist of The Year. His third novel, The People’s Act of Love (2005), received significant critical acclaim and went on to win the Scottish Arts Council Book of Year Award and the Ondaatje Prize. It has been translated into 20 languages. His fourth novel, We Are Now Beginning Our Descent (2008), won the Prince Maurice prize.
Alan Angell is Emeritus Fellow of St Antony’s College, Oxford and was formerly University Lecturer in Latin American Politics and Director of the Latin American Centre. His first published work was a study of the union movement in Chile published during the Allende government. He was made a Gran Oficial of the Order of Bernardo O’Higgins in 2007 for academic work on the country and for support for human rights during the Pinochet dictatorship. He has published widely, not only on Chilean politics but on the left in Latin America and aspects of social policy.
Syed Ashfaqul Haque is Chief News Editor at The Daily Star, the largest circulating English language daily newspaper in Bangladesh. Ashfaqul began his career as an apprentice subeditor at The Daily Star nearly 20 years ago, when the newspaper was a year old. In 2009 his investigative report on corruption in imports won the Transparency International Bangladesh (TIB) Investigative Journalism Award, the Unesco-Bangladesh Journalism Award and the Dhaka Reporters Unity Award for best economic investigative report. Ashfaqul talks to FiveBooks about his nation’s struggle for independence, the repression of journalists and his five favourite books about Bangladesh.
Robert Service is Professor of Russian Studies at St Antony’s College, Oxford. His research interests cover Russian history from the late 19th century to the present day and he has written numerous books on the subject. Nowadays he is focusing on Russia in its international framework. He is currently working on the geopolitics of the Russian Revolution as well as a study of the end of the Cold War. He talks to the Browser about the books that led to his passion and the importance of analysing the causes and outcomes of political processes.
Nabeel Yasin is one of Iraq’s most famous poets. His poems had him branded an enemy of the state under Saddam Hussein. He left Iraq for England 30 years ago with his wife and young son and continued to write and publish poetry from exile. Now he’s returned to his country and ran for prime minister in this month’s elections. ‘In our legacy here in Iraq we have some ideas about the conscience and duty of the state,’ he says. ‘Which should be to give happiness to the citizens, as numerous religious leaders have told us. For me there can be no kind of enlightenment without civil society.’
Philip Cowley is Professor of Parliamentary Government at the University of Nottingham. He is the author/editor of seven books and more than 50 articles, including articles for the British Journal of Political Science, Party Politics and the British Journal of Politics & International Relations. He runs revolts.co.uk, an academic research project looking at the way MPs and peers vote. We know quite a lot about how MPs behave in the House, he says. ‘We know almost nothing about how they behave in their constituencies – what they do with their time and then whether it matters. We think it matters but maybe not electorally or at least as much as they think. But in terms of generating good will amongst the constituents – does any of this matter or is it a big waste of time?’
The award-winning broadcast journalist and author thinks perceptions of Israel and Palestine are always filtered through expectation and prejudice. One of the reasons it is an unsolvable problem is, he believes, because the diaspora communities are incapable of seeing the situation through any kind of real or truthful perception. He chooses five books on Israel.