Ayad Akhtar in Conversation with Eleanor Wachtel
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\\u201cThe weight of politics in our country had coalesced and summoned a response out of me,\\u201d said Ayad Akhtar, the Pulitzer Prize-winning, Pakistani American novelist, playwright and screenwriter explained of his latest work, Homeland Elegies. Is it, he wondered, possible to write a letter to America in such a time\\u2014a letter to all Americans? Judging by the acclaim for this title, the answer is Yes. The story of the son of an immigrant father who searches for belonging in post-Trump America has been called \\u201ca revelation,\\u201d \\u201cprofound and provocative\\u201d and \\u201cAn unflinchingly honest self-portrait by a brilliant Muslim-American writer,\\u201d and the list continues. CBC Writers and Company host, Eleanor Wachtel, speaks to Akhtar about the unflinching honesty in this partly autobiographical work; the \\u201ccasino\\u201d that is American life; and the consequences of everyone becoming a storyteller in the era of social media.
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