Hisham Matar

“My Friends” (2024) by Hisham Matar is a masterpiece of exile, friendship, and the enduring weight of political history. Matar, who won the Pulitzer Prize for his memoir The Return, returns to fiction with a story that spans three decades, centering on three Libyan men living in London who are bound together by a single, violent afternoon.

The Premise: The 1984 St. James’s Square Protest

The novel is anchored by a real historical event: the 1984 protest outside the Libyan Embassy in London, where gunmen inside the embassy opened fire on peaceful protesters, killing a British policewoman and wounding several others.

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  Khaled: The narrator, a young student who travels from Libya to the UK to study. He finds himself drawn to the protest, where he is shot and wounded.

  
  


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  Mustafa: Khaled’s impulsive friend who is also wounded. His life becomes defined by his desire for revolution and his eventual return to Libya to fight.

  
  


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  Hosam: A famous writer whose short story inspired Khaled to dream of a different life. He eventually joins the two in London, forming an inseparable trio.

  
  

Key Themes: The Geometry of Exile

1. The Burden of Distance

Matar explores the “suspended life” of the exile. Khaled cannot return to Libya for decades because of his political involvement, yet he cannot fully commit to his life in London because his heart is elsewhere. He exists in a “middle space,” a theme Matar illustrates through his deep descriptions of London’s streets.

2. Friendship as Country

When a person loses their homeland, their friends become their “soil.” The relationship between Khaled, Mustafa, and Hosam is the central pillar of the book. Matar examines how friendships change over thirty years—through envy, shared trauma, and the divergent ways people react to the Arab Spring in 2011.

3. The Power of Literature

The novel is a love letter to books. For Khaled, literature is not just an escape; it is a way to map his own experience. The “friends” of the title refer not only to the people in his life but also to the writers and poets who sustain him in his isolation.

Why It’s a 2026 Literary Landmark

In 2026, My Friends is cited as one of the most significant novels of the decade for its portrayal of the “migrant experience” as something intellectual and deeply emotional, rather than just a headline.

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  The Prose Style: Matar’s writing is exceptionally elegant and quiet. It moves like a long walk through London, shifting between the present (Khaled walking to King’s Cross) and the vast history of his life.

  
  


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  The Historical Scope: It provides an essential window into Libyan history—from the oppressive rule of Gaddafi to the hope and eventual chaos of the 2011 revolution.