God's zoo : artists, exiles, Londoners /

This beautifully illustrated book consists of a series of encounters with writers, artists, and musicians living in London, all of whom are exiles or émigrés displaced from their cultural and geographical origins. The subjects include poet John Rety from Hungary, painter Fawzi Karim from Iraq, novelist Moris Farhi from Turkey, poet Martina Evans from Ireland, artist Ana Maria Pacheco from Brazil, actor Andrzej Borkowski from Poland, novelist Brian Chikwava from Zimbabwe, writer Hamid Ismailov and musician Razia Sultanova from Uzbekistan, poet Mimi Khalvati from Iran, filmmaker Rajan Khosa from India, and jazz bassist Coleridge Goode from Jamaica. The book concludes with an autobiographical account. Together, the chapters form a perceptive and moving enquiry into complex questions of migration, identity, and belonging as well as a tribute to the value of art and creativity in human lives.