What You Are

Weaving between wistful memories of youthful ambition and the compromises and comforts of age, travelling between the streets of Dar es Salaam and Toronto, the characters in these stories must negotiate distance between here and there; between lives imagined and lives lived; between expectation and disappointment; between inclusion and exclusion.

Throughout, Vassanji engages passionately with the intellectual and political questions that inspire him as a writer and a citizen, while always matching the energy of his ideas with the empathy and emotional depth he invests in his characters. As with all Vassanji's finest work,What You Arestands as a model of artistic integrity and clarity of vision. (From Doubleday Canada)

M.G. Vassanji is an author from Toronto. He has published short stories, novels, memoir and biography. He has won the Scotiabank Giller Prize twice: in 1994 forThe Book of Secretsand in 2003 forThe In-Between World of Vikram Lall.He is a member of the Order of Canada and has been awarded several honorary doctorates. His novelNostalgiawas defended onCanada Reads2017 by Jody Mitic.

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Interviews with M.G Vassanji

In 1994, author M. G. Vassanji shared about his former life as a nuclear physicist

7 years ago

Duration 1:19

In this video from the CBC Archives, M. G. Vassanji talks about his transition from science to literature, and his desire to document history through fiction.

Other books by M.G. Vassanji