When Shirin Ramzanali Fazel left Somalia, she was nearly eighteen and already had a family of her own, right around the time Siad Barre took power. In 1994, she published Far from Mogadishu in Italian, which is considered to be the first postcolonial novel by a Somali author in the diaspora. For many years, and even to this day, works by immigrant or exiled writers have been framed as 'literature of migration'. This label not only is reductive but it confines authors from diverse backgrounds to stories that touch upon only a limited set of themes. This chat also reflects on the limitations of this label, and it occurs after Shirin returned to Mogadishu after 50 years of absence.
© Shirin Ramzanali Fazel
Dear Shirin, first of all, thank you for accepting the invitation to be part of Imagining the Archipelago, an independent space through which I envision a decentralized, decolonized world that values our rich, plural cultural heritage, grounded in relations that extend horizontally like a rhizome, free from hierarchies and power hegemonies. To start, I would love to ask if you could share what the idea of the archipelago brings to your mind.
Dear Valentina, thank you for inviting me. When I close my eyes and think of the archipelago, this cluster of islands, I am reminded of our condition as individuals. Each of us with our own differences, stories, and languages, yet at the same time so united as communities that collaborate and exchange ideas, solidarity, and universal love.
Valentina Acava: The occasion for this interview is the release of your book The Scent of Uunsi, a collection of memories, thoughts, and reflections gathered over the past 50 years. If you could speak to the Shirin who wrote Far from Mogadishu, what would you tell her about the future world that lies ahead?
VA: Memory has always been at the core of your work. I would like to reflect on its significance within the diasporic context. Do you perceive a shift in how memory is approached among the second and third generations? Writer Elif Shafak argues that while the first generations of immigrants didn’t have the language to keep ties with the past, the second generation was kind of detached from this role of memory keepers as they had to invent a way to move forward in the new society, while the third and fourth generation (the youth of today, so to speak) are the ones seeking to connect with their ancestral heritage and roots. Do you agree with this perspective, and having lived between the UK and Italy, do you notice any differences in this regard?
SRF: I will answer this question from my own experience and from what I have observed within the Somali community.
For me, memory is preserved not only through stories and personal memories, but also through the language of origin. It can be difficult to preserve your own language when the world around you speaks differently. Language carries a way of seeing the world; it carries expressions, meanings, humour and memories that cannot always be translated.
The Somali community has experienced profound trauma since the civil war. Families were scattered across continents, often separated from one another by enormous distances. Despite this, they have worked hard to preserve their culture, religion and traditions. The Somali language has played an important role in this process, especially in keeping communication alive between generations and between families living in different parts of the world.
I also believe that the continuous relationship between immigrants and the family members who remained in Somalia has played a crucial role. The remittances sent to parents, grandparents, and other relatives were not only financial support. They also helped maintain a connection between families and kept that relationship with Somalia alive. Those connections have helped younger generations remain tied to their roots, even when they have grown up thousands of miles away.
Today, of course, the digital and social media age has changed things considerably. Younger generations can communicate directly with relatives, access Somali-language content, listen to stories and learn about their history and culture in ways that were simply not available to previous generations. They can also discover things for themselves rather than relying only on what their parents tell them.
I have seen this at first hand in Birmingham, where there is a large and vibrant Somali community. Living there has allowed me to observe how young Somalis negotiate these different worlds. They may speak English as their everyday language, but through their families, community, culture, and Somali language, many remain connected to where they come from.
In Italy, I have also seen younger generations becoming increasingly interested in questions of identity, language, and their African heritage. I would not say that the experience is exactly the same in the UK and Italy, because each community has its own history and circumstances. But in both places, I see young people asking questions that perhaps previous generations did not have the time or the space to ask.
So, perhaps I agree with Elif Shafak that each generation relates to memory differently. But I would add that memory does not simply disappear and then return. A younger generation begins to look for it in its own way.
For me, that is what is happening today. Young people are not simply receiving the memories of their parents and grandparents. They are also searching for their own connection with where they come from and deciding what that heritage means to them.
VA: I would like to remain on the topic of memory. I would love to reflect on Italian colonialism. In a country like Italy that struggles to promote schools as places for meeting, exchange, confrontation, and dialogue, often trapped in outdated programs and a utilitarian view of education, how can we overcome this deep void and reclaim a forgotten history? What other complementary spaces and individuals could serve as potential bridges to this chapter of Italian history?
SRF: In recent years, academics have produced important work on Italian colonialism. Unfortunately, much of this discussion still remains within the university world and does not reach a wider public. At the same time, in politics, right-wing ideas are becoming increasingly vocal, and immigrants are too often used as scapegoats for problems within Italian society.
I believe school is one of the most important places where we can begin to change this. Italian schools are already multicultural, multi-ethnic and multi-faith spaces, but school textbooks have not kept pace when it comes to teaching the history of colonialism. Young people should be given the opportunity to learn about this history from different perspectives, including the voices of people whose families experienced colonialism.
We need to bring diverse voices into the classroom. Teachers from different countries and backgrounds can help make multiculturalism something ordinary, something that belongs naturally to everyday life. Literature can also play an important role. We should encourage books that tell different stories and move beyond the stereotypical images of Africa and migration that are so often repeated in the media and by some politicians.
Writers, artists, filmmakers and theatre-makers can also create spaces for dialogue. Cinema and theatre can bring history closer to people in a different way, allowing audiences to encounter the past through stories, voices and experiences rather than only through textbooks. Libraries, cultural centres and literary festivals can also become places where these conversations continue outside the classroom.
I think Italy needs to begin genuinely confronting its colonial past. Colonialism is part of Italian history, and it has left traces that are still visible today, including in the way Africa and Africans are sometimes perceived.
This history is also important when we talk about migration. Italians themselves migrated to different parts of the world, and even today many young Italians leave the country in search of opportunities abroad. Migration is not something that only happens to Italy; it is also part of Italy's own history. If we want to understand migration, racism and multicultural Italy, we also need to understand where we have come from. Perhaps that is one of the first steps towards a more honest conversation.
VA: Living in the United Kingdom and engaging with various migrant communities of different lineages and ancestral heritage, have you noticed differences in how young people relate to colonial history compared to the youth in Italy?
SRF: Living in Birmingham, I have had the opportunity to meet people from many different migrant communities, with different histories and ancestral backgrounds. What I have noticed is that, for many young people in the UK, colonial history is not necessarily something distant or abstract. It can be part of their own family history.
For young people whose parents or grandparents came from former British colonies, the consequences of colonialism can be connected to family stories, migration and questions of identity. They may hear these stories at home, through their communities, or discover them for themselves through books, social media, museums and other cultural spaces.
This does not mean that every young person in Britain has a deep understanding of colonial history. The UK has its own silences and contradictions, and the subject can still be uncomfortable and controversial. But, from what I have seen, there is more space for these conversations to take place.
In Italy, from my experience, the situation has been different. Italian colonial history has for a long time been pushed to the margins, and many young Italians have grown up without really learning what happened in Somalia, Eritrea, Libya and Ethiopia. As I said earlier, our schools are already multicultural, but the history taught in those schools has not always reflected the diversity of the young people sitting in the classroom.
For me, this is where the difference becomes important. When young people have the opportunity to hear different voices and to connect history with their own family experiences and communities, history becomes something alive. It is no longer simply something that belongs in a textbook.
Living in Birmingham has made me realise how naturally many young people can live with more than one history. Their family may have roots in one country, they may have grown up in Britain, and they may feel connected to several cultures at the same time. They do not necessarily see these identities as something they have to choose between.
I think Italy is gradually moving in this direction too. We now have generations of young Italians whose families come from different parts of the world, and their presence is changing the way we think about what it means to be Italian. But I still believe that Italy needs to do much more to acknowledge its own colonial past and to make space for these different histories to be part of the national story.
VA: The world you describe in your stories is a world of women. I would like to ask you about the role of Somali women, and more generally, drawing from your experiences around the world, in preserving and transmitting culture and community. In The Scent of Uunsi you talk about food, clothing, rituals, support networks like the shalongo as unifying elements of the community. To what extent do these factors influence the ability of Somalis to withstand the challenges of the migrant experience and maintain a connection to Somalia?
SRF: The role of Somali women has also changed, particularly after the war. Many women arrived in the diaspora as widows and had to take on the role of both mother and father. They became the breadwinners of their families, responsible not only for providing for their children but also for their education and their future. Many divorced women have had to rebuild their lives and raise their children on their own. Adapting to a new country, a new environment, and a different way of life is not easy, especially when you are already carrying the trauma of war and displacement.
At the same time, women have continued to be the ones who keep many traditions alive. They pass on the language, the food, the recipes, the rituals, and the values of the community to their children. So, for many Somali women in the diaspora, preserving their culture has gone hand in hand with rebuilding their families and creating a new life for their children.
Community support has also been very important. Practices such as the shalongo create a network in which people support one another, especially in difficult moments. Weddings, funerals, religious celebrations and other important occasions bring people together. These are not simply social events. They are ways of maintaining relationships and reminding people that they are part of a wider community.
But the connection with Somalia and with the relatives who remained there has never been broken. The umbilical cord has always been there. The diaspora has continued to support families back home, sending remittances to parents, grandparents, brothers, sisters and other relatives who remained in Somalia. These were not simply financial contributions. They were also a way of maintaining a connection with the family and with the country we had left behind.
From my own personal experience, maintaining a connection with Somalia means living it every day through the language, through food and by keeping our recipes alive, through the ritual of prayer, and through coming together to celebrate weddings and mourn at funerals.
These things may seem simple, but they are powerful. They give people continuity when everything around them has changed. They help children born in the diaspora understand where their parents and grandparents come from, and they keep a relationship with Somalia alive even when you are living thousands of miles away.
When you leave your country, you carry it with you through these traditions. Even if the suitcase you leave with is small, somehow you manage to fit all of this inside it.
VA: Today, when discussing Somalia, the common perception is filled with stereotypes and inaccuracies, often lacking a genuine desire to understand this reality for these very reasons. Few people have a clear idea of what Somalia was like before Siad Barre came to power. You describe your city, Mogadishu, with affection and warmth, reminding those unaware of its history that it was a multicultural, multilingual city where customs, languages, traditions, and people were in conversation.
SRF: When I wrote Far from Mugadishu, Somalia was in the middle of the civil war. At that time, I felt it was important to tell the story of the Mogadishu I had known before the war: a multicultural and multilingual city, where different communities, languages, traditions, and ways of life were part of everyday life. I wanted to remind readers that there was a history and a life before the images of war that had come to define Somalia in the eyes of so many people. Mogadishu had a much longer history than the war and the years of Siad Barre’s regime, and I wanted that history to be remembered. I also wanted to remind Italian readers of their colonial past.
Thirty years have passed since I wrote that book. But it was more than fifty years after leaving Mogadishu that I finally returned to the city in 2026.
The city has changed, of course. From the very first day I arrived, speaking Soomaali again, I had the feeling of being home. Hearing my language around me, speaking it every day and being among my own people gave me a sense of belonging that I had missed without even realising it.
Language carries memories and ways of thinking. I even discovered the new slang used by young people, which made me smile and reminded me that the language, like the city, has continued to evolve.
I had also missed that immediate connection with people, the way you can speak to someone and feel that you share something without having to explain it. Being with my own people again gave my return another meaning. I was not simply visiting a city I had left decades earlier. I was reconnecting with the language, with people and with a part of my identity that had travelled with me all those years.
My return also made me think about how differently Mogadishu is often described from outside. The media still frequently presents it through a very narrow image, often as ‘the most dangerous city in the world’. Yet when you are there, you see people living, working, studying, creating businesses, meeting friends and making plans for the future. You see a city that is changing and moving forward.
VA: The theme of travel appears in various contexts throughout your work. Travel has been a part of Somali history and culture long before emigration in search of better opportunities; I think of the nomadism you mention, recalling your mother's childhood, which symbolized freedom of movement. Would you like to delve deeper into this aspect of travel in Somali culture and reflect on what philosopher Achille Mbembe refers to as the apartheid of travel, a discriminatory logic that determines who can travel and who can’t? I also ask you this because in your book you state that Somali English individuals, having the means, travel to Somaliland in search of their roots and to discover extended family connections. What happens when these journeys are not possible for one reason or another? What responsibility should each country take to ensure that the right to travel for all is guaranteed?
SRF: Travel has certainly been an important part of my life and of Somali culture. Long before migration became associated with leaving the country in search of better opportunities, movement was already part of Somali life. My mother, for example, grew up in a nomadic environment where moving from one place to another was part of everyday life. There was a sense of freedom in that movement which has stayed with me.
I would prefer, however, to approach this question through my own experience rather than in theoretical terms.
My most recent journey to Mogadishu, after more than fifty years away, is in many ways my answer to this question. But I am also very aware that not everyone has the possibility of making such a journey. This is where I understand what Achille Mbembe means by the ‘apartheid of travel’. The freedom to move is not the same for everyone. Money, passports, visas, political circumstances, borders and personal situations can all determine who can travel and who cannot.
For some people, returning to the country their family comes from may simply not be possible. They may not have the financial means, they may not be able to obtain a visa, or the political situation may make the journey impossible. Others may have lost their connection with a place because the generations before them were forced to leave.
This is why I think travel is also about privilege. I was fortunate to be able to return to Mogadishu after all those years. But I know that there are people who carry the same desire to return and may never have that opportunity.
I believe countries have a responsibility to make movement fairer and not turn travel into a privilege reserved for those with the right passport, enough money, or the right circumstances. Of course, countries have the right to control their borders, but there should also be a recognition that the ability to move, visit family, and reconnect with one's own history has a human dimension.
Perhaps this is why my journey to Mogadishu meant so much to me. I was able to travel back, walk through the streets, speak my language, and meet people who made me feel at home again. My journey allowed me to discover what had changed, but also what had remained.
VA: Words like travel, identity, diversity, and multiculturalism are currently contentious, often manipulated by both the media and political spheres. If you had to choose three words to pass on to the next generation, the one that is shaping the future in a divided, polarized world filled with anxieties and uncertainties, which would you choose?
SRF: If I had to choose three words to pass on to the next generation, I would choose memory, curiosity, and compassion.
Memory, because we cannot build the future by erasing the past. We need to remember where we come from, including the difficult and uncomfortable parts of our history. Memory helps us understand who we are and how we arrived where we are today.
Curiosity, because we should never accept the image of a person, a country, or a culture that is given to us without questioning it. Curiosity makes us look again, ask questions, listen, and discover what lies beyond stereotypes. This is something I have tried to do throughout my life, and especially when I returned to Mogadishu after more than fifty years away. I did not want to simply go back to the city I remembered. I wanted to see it for myself and understand what it had become.
And compassion, because in a world that is becoming increasingly divided, we need to remember the human being behind every label. Before we are immigrants, Europeans, Africans, Somalis, Muslims, or anything else, we are human beings.
These may sound like simple words, but I believe they matter. Memory can help us understand the past, curiosity can help us question what we are told, and compassion can help us see one another as human beings.
If the next generation can carry these three things with them, perhaps they will be better equipped to live in a world of diversity rather than fear it, and to build a world where there is more understanding and less division.
VA: In The Scent of Uunsi there is a more optimistic outlook regarding Somalia's future compared to your previous works. How do you realistically envision Somalia tomorrow, and in what ways will the Somali diaspora help shape the country?
SRF: My more optimistic outlook for Somalia comes directly from what I experienced during my most recent journey to Mogadishu. I saw a new city, particularly in the determination of a younger generation. Young people are studying, starting businesses, and pursuing their dreams despite the difficulties they face. What struck me most was their energy and their refusal to give up. They are not simply waiting for change; they are trying to create it themselves.
I also believe that the Somali diaspora will have an important role to play in shaping the country's future. But I do not see this as a one-way process, with the diaspora simply bringing ideas from abroad. The most interesting possibilities come from the meeting between those who have lived outside Somalia and those who have remained there.
This meeting can create a kind of cultural exchange, a meticciato, where different experiences come together. People in the diaspora can bring new perspectives, knowledge and skills, while those living in Somalia bring their own experience of the country, its realities and its needs. Neither side has all the answers.
For me, the challenge is to embrace change without losing ourselves. Somalia does not need to reproduce Western cultural trends to move forward. It can modernise while preserving its own traditions and cultural identity, allowing them to evolve naturally rather than being diluted or replaced.
I also think the diaspora needs to listen as much as it wants to contribute. After living abroad for many years, we may bring different ideas and experiences, but we also need to understand how much Somalia itself has changed. We cannot simply return with solutions. We have to meet people where they are and build things together.
What I saw in Mogadishu gave me a sense that this process has already begun. The future will not belong exclusively to those who stayed or to those who left. It will be shaped by the meeting between the two by people who can bring together different experiences, while remaining connected to the country, its culture and its identity.
VA: Reflecting on the diaspora, I found myself drawn to the work of philosopher Nadia Kisukidi, who envisions the diaspora as an ideal of a transnational and transcultural circular world, but only after the Global South has cut its ties of dependency on the Global North, only when one world will not anymore be forced to disappear so that the other can live. How do you relate to this idea?
SRF: I relate to this idea, although I would approach it from my own experience rather than in philosophical terms.
Having lived between different countries and cultures, I have never seen the diaspora as belonging entirely to one place or another. For me, it is a space between worlds, where experiences, knowledge and different ways of seeing can circulate.
But this exchange has to be reciprocal. The diaspora should not return to Somalia simply to bring a Western model and tell people who have remained there how they should change. Somalia has its own knowledge, traditions, culture and ways of understanding community, and these should be part of the conversation.
This is something I saw during my recent return to Mogadishu. I met young people who had never left Somalia and others who had lived abroad, and I found the exchange between them very interesting. Each side has something to offer, but also something to learn from the other.
I believe this is where the diaspora can become a real resource: not by replacing one way of life with another, but by creating a space where different experiences can meet without one disappearing.
For me, this is also what cultural mixing means. We can embrace new ideas, technology, education and different ways of living while preserving our language, traditions and cultural memory. One does not have to disappear for the other to exist.
Perhaps this is the kind of transnational world I recognise from my own life: not a world in which one side gives and the other receives, but one in which we move in both directions, carrying something with us and bringing something back.
VA: The poet Derek Walcott once said that language is never neutral. Your work contains linguistic multitudes. When you write in Italian, you are making a specific choice, just as you do when you use Somali. How has the oral tradition of Somali influenced/shaped your Italian and English? Also, reflect on how language can sometimes shift meaning to serve political agendas, as you point out in your last book?
SRF: I grew up in a culture where stories were carried through the spoken word. They were told within the family, by mothers, grandmothers, and elders. The Somali oral tradition has always been very rich, and I think that voice has stayed with me, even when I began writing in Italian and later in English.
I did not leave Somali behind when I began writing in other languages. I carried its voice with me.
The rhythm of the spoken language, the importance of repetition, the use of images and metaphors, and the way a story can move between memory, observation, and reflection have all influenced the way I write. Even when the words are Italian or English, there is something of the Somali way of telling a story underneath them.
This is also why, for me, using Somali words within an Italian or English text is not simply a matter of adding something exotic. Those words carry meanings and memories that sometimes cannot be fully translated. They are part of the voice of the story.
And I agree that language is never neutral. Words can be used to describe reality, but they can also be used to construct a particular version of reality. This is especially powerful when we talk about Africa, migration and colonial history.
A word such as ‘immigrant’ can carry a very different meaning depending on the context in which it is used. The same is true of the words used to describe Somalia. For decades, certain political and media narratives have reduced Somalia to images of war, poverty, terrorism and danger. When those words are repeated often enough, they begin to replace the complexity of the country itself.
This is something I have tried to challenge in my writing. I want to reclaim the right to tell the story in my own words, and to bring back the voices, memories and experiences that have been left out.
For me, writing in Italian or English does not mean abandoning Somali. It means bringing Somali with me into another language, allowing the languages to meet rather than forcing one to disappear.
VA: Last year, at the Macondo Literary Festival in Nairobi, writer Kevin Jared Hosein mentioned that works by authors whose cultures are shaped by multilingualism, like those from the Caribbean like himself, shouldn't require a glossary to explain terms in patois or creole, as he sees this as a way to decolonize languages from former colonies. In your books, you don't include glossaries, allowing readers to understand Somali words within the narrative. Does this choice relate to Hosein's idea?
SRF: Yes, I recognise my own approach in what Kevin Jared Hosein is saying. In my books, I deliberately use Somali words without providing a glossary.
For me, Somali words belong naturally within the story. I do not want to stop the reader every time they encounter a word they may not know and give them an explanation. I want them to meet the word within its context and gradually understand its meaning through the story, just as we do when we enter a language or a culture that is not entirely our own.
A Somali word can carry much more than its literal translation. It can contain a memory, a cultural reference, a particular emotion, or an entire way of seeing the world. Sometimes, translating it or explaining it too much takes something away from it.
I also believe that the reader does not need to understand every word immediately. There can be a certain pleasure in discovering meaning through context, just as we learn a language by listening, observing, and gradually absorbing it. I trust the reader to make that journey.
So, for me, allowing Somali to exist naturally within Italian or English is also a way of saying that my language does not always need to be explained or translated for someone else to accept it. It can simply be there.
The Somali words are not there as decoration, and they are not there to make the text look more ‘authentic’. They are part of my voice, my memory and my identity as a writer.
And perhaps this is where I connect most strongly with Hosein's idea. I want the languages in my books to meet on equal terms. I do not want Somali to be a language that always has to ask permission to be understood.
VA: Shirin, I would like to share a personal reflection on the act of self-translation. Given that translation is not merely about transferring words from one language to another, but rather an exercise in crossing boundaries, what emotional and decision-making challenges has this process posed for you?
SRF: For me, self-translation can be quite emotional. When I translate my own writing, I am not simply changing words from one language into another. I am trying to keep the feeling behind those words and to make sure that the person who reads the translation receives something of what I felt when I wrote the original.
Sometimes I know exactly what I want to say in Somali or Italian, but when I move into English, the same sentence does not have the same weight. The words may be correct, but they may not sound like me. So, I have to make choices. I ask myself: does this still sound like my voice? Does it still carry the emotion I felt when I wrote it?
Sometimes I have to move away from the literal translation because, although it may be accurate, it does not work in English. I may change the structure of a sentence, choose a different expression, or simplify something, but I always try to keep the meaning and the feeling behind it.
There are also Somali words that I choose not to translate. Some things are deeply connected to my culture and my memories, and translating them would make them smaller or less meaningful. I want the reader to encounter those words and understand them through the context.
So self-translation is often a matter of making choices. It means moving between languages without allowing one language to erase the other. Sometimes it feels almost like crossing a bridge: you leave one language, but you have to make sure that something of where you came from arrives on the other side.
The most important thing for me is that, whichever language I am writing in, I do not lose my own voice.
VA: Somalia has a long, rich oral poetry tradition since the written language came into existence only in 1972. Like many places that were once colonized, Somalia has somewhat lost its sense of self due to the historical vicissitudes. We both know that for any people in the world, in order to imagine themselves into the future, they need to get rid of ties of subordination. That’s how literature plays a huge role in shaping one’s people's imagination. Would you like to share with us how the readership in Somalia is today ( if there is ) and the state of its literary scene in the country and in the diaspora?
SRF: I would answer this question from what I saw during my recent visit to Mogadishu, rather than trying to give a general picture of the Somali literary scene.
The oral tradition is still very strong. Poetry has always been an important part of Somali culture, and it has never depended entirely on books. Stories, poems, memories and knowledge have traditionally been passed from one generation to another through the spoken word. So, for me, Somali literature did not begin with the written language. There was already a rich literary tradition carried through poetry, storytelling and memory.
Today, things are changing. During my visit, I saw a young generation that is much more connected to reading, writing and new forms of communication. Social media and digital platforms have opened new spaces for young Somali writers and readers to share their ideas and their work. They have also made it easier for young people to access Somali-language writing and to discover what others are writing.
I did not get the impression that there is yet a large literary market in Somalia comparable to that of other countries. There are still difficulties when it comes to access to books, publishing opportunities, and the economic conditions of the country. But what I noticed was a real desire among young people to read, to write and, above all, to tell their own stories.
The diaspora is also very important in this respect. Somali writers living in Britain, Europe, North America and elsewhere are writing in Somali, English and other languages. They are writing about migration, identity, family, memory and Somalia from very different perspectives. In some ways, the diaspora has created another space for Somali literature to grow and to reach readers beyond Somalia.
For me, this is particularly important because for so many years Somalia has often been described by outsiders mainly through war, poverty and political instability. Literature gives Somali people the opportunity to speak for themselves. It allows them to tell stories about love, family, everyday life, history and hopes for the future, not only about suffering.
And I think the oral tradition still has an important role to play.
VA: Writers are the curators of humanity. Once Chris Abani said, we are the memory keepers of a past. What are the main challenges you face as a writer in ferrying the past into the future?
SRF: I think one of the biggest challenges for me as a writer is keeping the past alive in a world that is moving so quickly.
Today, technology has changed our relationship with time. We are constantly receiving new images, new stories, and new information. Something that happened only a few years ago can already feel like a distant past.
As a writer, I feel that part of my responsibility is to slow things down. To stop for a moment and say: look at this. Remember this person. Remember this place. This happened, and it mattered.
When I write about my childhood in Mogadishu, for example, I am not simply looking backwards. I am trying to give younger generations something they did not experience themselves: a city, a way of life, a language, family stories and traditions that belong to their history, even if they were not there to experience them.
But the challenge is not simply to preserve the past. It is to make it meaningful to someone who was not there. I cannot simply say, ‘This is what happened.’ I have to bring the reader into that world through the senses, through people, through small details and emotions. That is when memory becomes alive rather than something that belongs only to the past.
I also think that writers have to accept that we cannot preserve everything. We choose what we carry forward, and sometimes what we choose to remember tells us something about who we are today.
For me, writing is a way of carrying something forward. I take what I have lived, what I have been told, and what I remember, and I pass it on to someone I may never meet.
Perhaps that is what it means to be a keeper of memory. We cannot stop time, and we cannot preserve everything. But we can choose some stories, give them a voice, and make sure they are not lost.
VA: I would like to invite you to reflect on an argument that has been going on for a long time in the Global North that was even raised by author Sulemain Addonia, who pointed out how the publishing industry in the Western world expects Black African authors to write only about certain experiences, claiming his freedom of imagination. As a Somali Italian writer, have you ever experienced this pressure?
SAF: Yes, I have experienced this, and I think it is still a problem for many writers from Africa and from migrant backgrounds.
For a long time, Western publishing has expected certain kinds of stories from us. If you are a Black African writer, there is often an expectation that you should write about immigration, racism, war, identity or suffering. These are important subjects, of course, and they are part of our lives. But they cannot be the only things we are allowed to imagine.
I have often seen my own writing described as ‘immigrant literature’. I have never felt completely comfortable with that label. I am a Somali and Italian writer, but I am also simply a writer. I should be free to write about whatever interests me, just like any other writer.
When Lontano da Mogadiscio was published, there was already a tendency to place my work in a particular category because of where I came from. More recently, I have been pleased to see academics recognising writers like me as part of Italian literature, rather than placing us permanently outside it.
For me, this is an important change. Our background is part of who we are, but it should not become a literary cage. My freedom as a writer also means having the freedom to imagine beyond the expectations that others may have of me. I am trying to do exactly that through my poetry, which I see as a universal form of expression, through my short stories, and through my book, Islam and Me: Narrating the Diaspora. These works have allowed me to explore other sides of who I am and the questions that matter to me, without feeling that I have to fit into a particular category.
For me, this is also part of being free as a writer: my origins are part of my story, but they do not define the limits of what I can imagine or what I can write.
VA: In your travel bag, you have a book by a Somali author you are going to gift a friend to let them know better your country, which one will you choose?
SRF: I would choose Exploring the Old Stone Town of Mogadishu by Nuredin Hagi Scikei.
I would give this book to a friend because it introduces the old Mogadishu, its medieval history, and the rich heritage of the Banaadiri people. It brings to life the stone houses, mosques, streets, and traditions shaped by centuries of trade across the Indian Ocean.
Mogadishu was never an isolated place. It was connected through trade and travel to India, China, the Middle East, and Southeast Asia. These connections were part of the city's life long before European colonialism.
This is important to me because Somalia has a long history of its own, but much of this history is still not taught in Western schools. Too often, when Somalia is discussed, the story begins with colonialism, dictatorship, or the civil war. There is so much more that came before.
This book allows the reader to discover older Somalia through its architecture, its people, and its links with the wider world. For me, that is why I would put it in a friend's travel bag: to show them a Somalia with a history that existed long before the images we have become accustomed to seeing.
Shirin Ramzanali Fazel was born in Mogadishu to a Somali Pakistani family and moved to Italy in 1971 following Siad Barre's coup. After living in different countries, she is now based in the UK.
Among her literary works translated into English are Far from Mogadishu (Create Space, 2016), Islam and Me: Narrating a Diaspora (Rutgers University Press), and Clouds over the Equator. The Forgotten Italians (Independently Published), the poetry collections Wings (Create Space, 2017), I Suckled Sweetness (Create Space, 2020), and the essay Scrivere di Islam. Sguardi al femminile (2020). Her work also appears in various anthologies, including Roma d'Abissinia. Cronache dai resti dell'Impero: Asmara, Mogadiscio, Addis Abeba (Nerosubianco, 2010), Doors: Writing for Refugees (Bromsgrove Printing, 2020), Moments in Time (Writers Without Borders, 2015), Sandwell's Book of Happiness (Sandwell NHS, 2012), Lingua Madre. Racconti di donne straniere in Italia (Edizioni SEB27), Mogadiscio. Ancora tu (2026) with the afterword by Paolo Miccoli.