How Do We Face Loss With Dignity?

<p>In his latest work, “<a href="https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/703278/the-last-white-man-by-mohsin-hamid/" target="_blank">The Last White Man</a>,” the award-winning writer Mohsin Hamid imagines a world that is very like our own, with one major exception: On various days, white people wake up to discover that their skin is no longer white. It’s a heavy premise, but one of Hamid’s unique talents as a novelist is his ability to take on the most difficult of topics — racism, migration, loss — with a remarkably light touch.</p><p>“How do you begin to have these conversations in a way that allows everybody a way in?” Hamid asks at one point in our conversation. “How do you talk about these things in a way that’s open to everyone?” What sets Hamid apart is his capacity to do just that — both in his fiction and in our conversation. We discuss:</p><ul><li>How Hamid experienced what it was like to lose his whiteness after 9/11</li><li>What happens to a society when suddenly we can’t sort ourselves by race</li><li>The origins of modern humans’ fear of death — and how to overcome it</li><li>Why Hamid thinks future humans will look back at the idea of borders with moral horror</li><li>Why Hamid believes that pessimistic realism is a “deeply conservative” worldview</li><li>Hamid’s process for imagining optimistic futures</li><li>Why Hamid believes that the very notion of the self is a fiction</li><li>Why we turn to activities like sex, drugs and meditation when we get overwhelmed</li><li>How America’s policies toward immigrants and refugees should challenge our “heroic” sense of national identity</li><li>What Toni Morrison taught Hamid about how to read and write</li></ul><p>And more.</p><p>Mentioned:</p><p><a href="https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/The-Metamorphosis/Franz-Kafka/Enriched-Classics/9781416599685" target="_blank">"The Metamorphosis</a><strong>"</strong> by Franz Kafka</p><p><a href="https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/549017/exit-west-by-mohsin-hamid/" target="_blank">Exit West</a> by Mohsin