The Egyptian novelist, who was jailed last year for `violating public morality´ with his novel The Use of Life, looks back at an experience he hopes is now overAfter seeing a photo of him, Zadie Smith imagined Ahmed Naji as someone wild and antic. (`Rather handsome, slightly louche-looking, with a Burt Reynolds moustache, wearing a Nehru shirt in a dandyish print and the half smile of someone both amusing and easily amused` she observed in the New York Review of Books - without having met him.) Just a short extract of his prose allegedly gave one reader heart palpitations, and, for one judge, his language - `pussy, cock, licking, sucking`, according to court documents - was enough to justify a two-year jail sentence.It´s hard to equate these intense, fleeting impressions with the quietly spoken man in front of me sipping green tea. Related: Philip Roth, Patti Smith and Woody Allen join protest at jailing of Egyptian writer Continue reading...
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