I've lived almost a decade in the UK, a decade and a half each in the United States and Pakistan, a year or so in the Far East and in the Mediterranean. Currently my home is in Lahore, so I suppose I'm part of a reverse diaspora - the diaspora of members of the Pakistani diaspora who live in Pakistan. All of it, every life experience, affects my fiction, because my fiction comes from who I am.
Ever since I left Pakistan to go to college in the US, I'd planned to go back. And I did, several times, for year-long stays. But I never relished the idea of working for someone else in Pakistan. The professional scene here can be frustrating. I also never relished the idea of having children who would grow up far from their grandparents in Lahore. Recently I became able to make a living from my writing, and last year my wife and I had a baby girl. The time had come to move back.
I come from an enormous and very close family. I have over a dozen aunts and uncles in Pakistan, dozens of cousins. I have many close friends. I have received so much love in Lahore that the city always pulls me.
How does Lahore's cultural scene differ from London's?
There are many cultural scenes in Lahore, just as there are in London. And there is a celebrity culture here, just as there is in London. But in Lahore, the celebrity scene doesn't drown out the rest quite so much. Lahore is much cheaper than London, so money is less of a crushing pressure on culture. There are incredible things happening here in cutting-edge music, conceptual art and experimental fiction. It's difficult to compare the cultural scenes in the two places. I love both. But there is something earthy about Lahore. When a poet says something that is true, people spontaneously grunt their agreement, and that moves me.
Full interview here New Statesman
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