13 Facts About Kamila Shamsie

Kamila Shamsie is a Pakistani and British writer and novelist who is best known for her award-winning novel Home Fire.

Kamila Shamsie was born into a well-to-do family of intellectuals in Karachi, Pakistan.

Kamila Shamsie's mother is journalist and editor Muneeza Shamsie, her great-aunt was writer Attia Hosain and she is the granddaughter of memoirist Jahanara Habibullah.

Kamila Shamsie wrote her first novel, In the City by the Sea, while still in college, and it was published in 1998 when she was 25.

Kamila Shamsie is the author of the non-fiction work Offence: The Muslim Case.

Kamila Shamsie attended the 2011 Jaipur Literature Festival, where she spoke about her style of writing.

Kamila Shamsie participated in the Bush Theatre's 2011 project Sixty-Six Books, with a piece based on a book of the King James Bible.

Kamila Shamsie was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature in 2011.

Kamila Shamsie has contributed to such international events as the Cleveland Humanities Festival and the NGC Bocas Lit Fest in Trinidad, in 2016, and is a patron of the Manchester Literature Festival.

Kamila Shamsie delivered the 2018 Orwell Lecture at University College London, with the title "Unbecoming British: citizenship, migration and the transformation of rights into privileges".

In 2021, Kamila Shamsie was a judge for the Goldsmiths Prize, alongside Nell Stevens, Fred D'Aguiar and Johanna Thomas-Corr.

Kamila Shamsie moved to London in 2007 and is a dual national of the UK and Pakistan.

Kamila Shamsie contributed a chapter, "The Women's XI", to the book The Authors XI: A Season of English Cricket from Hackney to Hambledon, collectively written by members of the team to chronicle their first season together.