Fresh Air
Best Of: A Writer Grapples With A Life-Changing Accident / The Post WWII 'Red Scare'
Sat, 29 Mar 2025
Hanif Kureishi began his new memoir just days after a fall left him paralyzed. He describes being completely dependent on others — and the sense of purpose he's gained from writing. The memoir is called Shattered.David Bianculli reviews the British series Ludwig.Writer Clay Risen describes a political movement which destroyed the careers of thousands of teachers, civil servants and artists whose beliefs or associations were deemed un-American. His book, Red Scare, is about post-World War II America, but he says there's a throughline connecting that era to our current political moment.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy
How did Hanif Kureishi's life change after his accident?
From WHYY in Philadelphia, I'm Terry Gross with Fresh Air Weekend. Today, how life can change in a second. Hanif Qureshi's writing career got off to a remarkable start after briefly writing porn to make a living. His first screenplay, My Beautiful Laundrette, was nominated for an Oscar.
In 2022, he fell, lost consciousness, and when he came to, he saw these objects he didn't recognize until he realized they were his hands.
But I had no agency over them. I thought that they were, you know, sort of live creatures, curled live creatures.
We'll talk about life before and after the fall. Also, journalist Clay Risen takes us back to the anti-communist frenzy of the post-World War II era. Risen sees a through line running from that era to our own. And TV critic David Bianculli reviews the new mystery series Ludwig. That's coming up on Fresh Air Weekend. This is Fresh Air Weekend. I'm Terry Gross.
I first became aware of Hanif Qureshi when the 1985 film My Beautiful Laundrette was released. He was nominated for an Oscar for his screenplay about a side of contemporary England that had rarely been explored on screen, Pakistani immigrants and their children. The film was a lively romantic comedy about gay love, family, racism, and punk rock.
It was directed by Stephen Frears and co-starred Daniel Day-Lewis as a young man in a relationship with the son of a Pakistani immigrant. Qureshi has since written other screenplays and novels, including The Buddha of Suburbia. His new memoir, called Shattered, begins in 2020 after a fall that injured his spinal cord, leaving him unable to move his arms or legs.
He describes being unrecognizable to himself, disconnected from his body, totally dependent on others. feeling helpless and humiliated, dealing with rage, envying other people who could do even basic things like scratch an itch. While spending too much time on his back staring at the ceiling, he reflected on earlier periods of his life. He shares those reflections in his book.
He spent a year in hospitals before he was able to return home with round-the-clock caregivers. He started writing the memoir just days after the accident by dictating to one of his sons. The book's narrative is occasionally interrupted by asides like, excuse me for a moment, I must have an enema now.
Qureshi is the son of a British mother and a father who emigrated from Pakistan in the late 1940s. Hanif Qureshi, welcome back to Fresh Air. We first spoke in 1990 on Fresh Air, and you've been on two times since then, so welcome back. How are you now? How much movement do you have?
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