Theft

by Abdulrazak Gurnah

In his first new novel since winning the 2021 Nobel Prize, a master storyteller captures a time of dizzying global change.

At the turn of the twenty-first century, three young people come of age in Tanzania. Karim returns to his sleepy hometown after university with new swagger and ambition. Fauzia glimpses in him a chance at escape from a smothering upbringing. The two of them offer a haven to Badar, a poor boy still unsure if the future holds anything for him at all. As tourism, technology, and unexpected opportunities and perils reach their quiet corner of the world, bringing, each arrives at a different understanding of what it means to take your fate into your own hands.

Genres: Fiction, Africa, Historical Fiction, Literary Fiction, Tanzania, Contemporary, Nobel Prize

Audible Audio

First published March 18, 2025

About the author

Abdulrazak Gurnah was born in 1948 in Zanzibar and lives in England, where he teaches at the University of Kent. The most famous of his novels are Paradise, shortlisted for both the Booker and the Whitbread Prize; By the Sea, longlisted for the Booker Prize and shortlisted for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize; and Desertion, shortlisted for the Commonwealth Prize. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2021 "for his uncompromising and compassionate penetration of the effects of colonialism and the fate of the refugee in the gulf between cultures and continents".

Reviews

[emma · Rating 4 out of 5]

an author i like won the nobel prize. so i'm basically on the committee.

add to that the fact that i maybe find one character i truly love per year and i found him in this book...and everything's coming up me.

badar, a semi-adopted boy who is shipped off to be the servant of his cousin's family, probably never has an emotion straight up written to the page, and yet he is so sensitively and evocatively portrayed that my heart wrenched just to read about him.

my main complaint is that this book is three-ish perspectives and not all about him. every other character paled in comparison. 

this was interesting on the subject of tourism and free will, but badar will be what i remember.

bottom line: sound off in the comments below to join my badar fan club.

(thanks to the publisher for the arc)

[Daniel Shindler · Rating 4 out of 5]

Abdulrazak Gurnah is an author who takes his time unfolding a story. He gives both character and theme plenty of space to breathe and take flight. “ Theft,” his first release since winning the Nobel Prize, is a work of subtle contrasts. It is a gentle novel that combines turbulence and calm, intertwining plot and theme in a slowly developing melodrama of personal and political circumstance.

In his previous works that I have read, Gurnah has focused on the trauma experienced by people leaving their home and acclimating to a new host nation.”Theft” is more inward looking. The characters in this novel have remained in their homeland yet have still lost their homes and experienced abandonment and the pain of displacement. In effect, Gurnah is examining a different aspect of post colonial trauma. His protagonists have been rooted in their native country but have still lost their place in the world.

The story is carried forward by three young people who are intent on navigating the turbulence of post colonial Tanzania. Although the youngsters have not experienced the violence that ended colonization, they nevertheless are swept up in its aftermath, experiencing psychological displacements rooted in personal and familial conflicts.Each of them has encountered rejection or personal difficulties during their formative years. Karim has been abandoned to the care of his grandparents when his mother Raya left her first marriage. She eventually remarried and reconnected with her son when Karim became a rising academic star who lived in her household while attending university. While living there, Karim meets and forms a bond with Badar.Badar’s father was a disgraced thief who abandoned Badar to adoptive parents who ultimately send him to Raya’s household as a domestic servant. Badar radiates a sense of degradation that strikes an empathetic chord with Karim, leading to a symbiotic, nurturing relationship between the two adolescents.Finally, Karim meets and eventually marries Fauzia , a young woman who overcame childhood sleeping ailments, leveraging academic success into a teaching career.

As the three protagonists move from teenage to adulthood, their lives intertwine,diverge and reattach. Individual problems blend with greater political concerns, creating an undercurrent of personal and social uncertainty.Gurnah leisurely spends time with each character’s story before synthesizing the disparate threads into a portrait of individuals and society in a transitional era.

“Theft” is a work that fuses interconnected lives and themes. In fact, theft is a wide ranging metaphor that runs throughout the novel affecting the lives of each protagonist on several levels. Theft manifests itself as loss of trust between government and citizens; loss of affection and trust between individuals; loss of home and homeland through the ravages of colonialism.

“Theft” is a novel of slowly discovered delights and small epiphanies. While some readers might not embrace its leisurely pace, I found the novel engrossing, raising many issues resonating in our current geopolitical world. I left the novel wondering who in my world are the real thieves, what has been truly stolen and how these thefts impact my life.

[Ron Charles · Rating 4 out of 5]

In his acceptance speech for the 2021 Nobel Prize in literature, Abdulrazak Gurnah extolled storytelling that sees what “the hard domineering eye cannot see, what makes people, apparently small in stature, feel assured in themselves regardless of the disdain of others.” Such writing, the Zanzibari novelist said, requires a way of looking that “makes room for frailty and weakness, for tenderness amid cruelty, and for a capacity for kindness in unlooked-for sources.”

“Theft,” the first novel Gurnah has published since winning the Nobel, offers an example of such compassionate, revelatory seeing. Even the structure of this story works against the hierarchical nature of plot — that common sense that this character is central and those merely peripheral. There’s something almost disorienting about Gurnah’s narrative as he moves from one person to the next, willfully thwarting our desire to settle on a protagonist.

Oh, he’ll get there eventually, but he’s not to be rushed as he examines the lives of an expanding family of characters in Tanzania in the late 20th century.

“Theft” is a quieter, more delicate novel than Gurnah’s “Afterlives,” which The Washington Post named one of the top 10 books of 2022. That novel contends directly with the injuries of European colonialism; in “Theft” the wounds have healed over, but the telling limp remains. Here, Gurnah is interested in the ways that abuse is stored in the body, where it either calcifies into malice or metabolizes into compassion.

The story begins with Raya, a beautiful teenage girl married off to a contractor in his 40s who forces himself on her every night. “He was charming with other people,” Gurnah writes, “but he reserved his cruelty for her and took pleasure in it, and she feared that one day his viciousness would become violent.” When their son, Karim, is 3, Raya says enough and moves back to her parents’ house. Gossips be damned, she must protect her son. And yet, soon Raya discovers. . .

To read the rest of this review, go to The Washington Post:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/books/...

[Hannah · Rating 2 out of 5]

I wanted so much to like this book more - not only because the author is a Nobel winner, but also because it was my first book set in Tanzania. For any other reason, I would've DNFd it. I should have. I was bored for almost the entire time. The first and last couple of chapters were pretty good drama, but the rest of it was a snore. I won't be trying this writer out again.

Rounding up to 2.

[Andre(Read-A-Lot) · Rating 5 out of 5]

An unembellished story of how you play the cards that life has dealt you. Through simple, yet elegant prose, Mr. Gurnak brings together three disparate characters as their story arcs eventually intersect, and though the novel is plain in its’ construction the overall effect is one of exquisite engagement. It is an occupying story that has a bit of artifice that will keep you chasing the end. A servant boy can go from lowliness to a loftier status. A sheltered young lady from stifling overbearing circumstances to a woman embodying freedom. An ethical son to a moral-less mess of a husband. Yes, this can happen in these pages from the pen of a Nobel laureate. I enjoyed this book enough, and now the quest to read some more of Gurnak has begun.

[None Ofyourbusiness Loves Israel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Gurnah's "Theft" examines familial complexities and post-colonial tensions through characters whose identities exist in spaces between belonging and exclusion. The story follows Badar, a young man whose position in a Tanzanian household hovers between family member and servant. When accused of stealing groceries, his already uncertain place in Baba's stern household faces jeopardy, unleashing revelations about concealed bloodlines. "The rooms of that house had walls thick with secrets," Gurnah writes, "and I lived among them like a ghost, never quite seen for who I truly was."

The plot expands to trace Karim's life—Raya's son born from her difficult marriage to Bakari Abbas—as he navigates adulthood, professional aspirations, and growing discontent in his marriage. His relationship with Jerry Bruno, an English volunteer, becomes the axis on which his marriage to Fauzia eventually breaks—a "stealthy appropriation of joy" with devastating consequences. Gurnah connects Karim's personal betrayal with historical legacies of colonialism in Zanzibar, creating parallel stories of possession and loss that continue through generations. Concurrently, Uncle Othman's declining health brings reflections on mortality and how time takes youth, health, and life itself.

The relationship between the Mistress and Badar highlights class differences with exactitude, while Haji's protective attitude toward Badar reveals cracks in family loyalty. When Karim leaves Fauzia—"leaving her like a house with its doors unlocked"—Badar steps forward as unexpected support, suggesting that human connection can persist through significant loss.

Gurnah, the Tanzanian-born Nobel laureate whose expatriate experience gives his work authentic perspective, suggests that while material possessions, relationships, and even certainties about our origins can disappear, our ability to create new identities and meaning from disruption continues—perhaps the sole possession that cannot be taken away.

[Paul Fulcher · Rating 2 out of 5]

Much of what was expected of him at school was tedious, it seemed to him, but he exerted himself to the extent necessary to maintain self-respect and not be thought stupid. There was also sports. He was athletic in a dogged way, a quality which made him a competitor, not a winner, and which got him on to the school football team, where he was rated a tough, disciplined defender.

This is Abdulrazak Gurnah's first novel since he surprisingly won the Nobel Prize in Literature for 2021, awarded “for his uncompromising and compassionate penetration of the effects of colonialism and the fate of the refugee in the gulf between cultures and continents.” This novel feels, for large parts, something of a departure from that theme into the realms of conventional family saga, with a rather tangled plot explained in Gumble's Yard - Golden Reviewer's Review.

I previously have read his novel Paradise which was Booker shortlisted in 1994, the year (from the Independent) the marketing director of the influential Dillons bookshops, said: 'It's a boring, Mogadon list. We've been active in promoting the shortlist in the past, but this year we feel it doesn't warrant special attention', and my review of Paradise concluded "dull but well-written at the sentence level and worthy is perhaps the best description for this one".

Theft was perhaps a more interesting read, but less 'worthy' - not one I suspect the Nobel Committee would have featured in their biobibliography had it been available - and at times feels rather padded with unnecessary detail. For example when one character moves into a rented room we get this (and it continues for another paragraph).

The room that Karim found for Badar was in a house which at some earlier time had been occupied by a merchant and his extended family. The merchant had long since passed away and his family had scattered, who knows where, except for one son who worked in a furniture warehouse in Dar es Salaam and was keen to sell. The house now belonged to a man called Hakim who had been working for many years in Abu Dhabi, in a transport business delivering goods to shops and groceries all over the United Arab Emirates. His wife and children had remained behind in Zanzibar, living with his parents in a small flat in Miembeni. Hakim had come to visit them whenever he could. After some years, he was able to buy a small share in the transport business. There was already another part-owner, a Somali man from Bukoba, whose name was Abdirahman, who like Hakim had also started out working in a humble position and by diligence and trust-worthiness had acquired a share in the business. The main owner, the money bags of the enterprise, was an Abu Dhabi man who only concerned himself from a distance but kept a close eye on the paperwork and knew how to reward his partners.

None of the characters ever appear again and this is irrelevant to what came before or after.

The novel only really hits its stride in the closing pages when a young woman from a NGO, after an overseas-posting fling, disrupts the family dynamics, and as one character calls out:

What do these people want with us? Why do they come here? They come here with their filth and their money and interfere with us and ruin our lives for their pleasure, and it seems that we cannot resist their wealth and their filthy ways. What do they want with us? Everywhere you go you see them, in the narrowest alley and street, there they are, looking into people’s houses and down people’s throats, and alongside them will be one of our shameless young men, grinning like a monkey while he does his blather. Don’t they have seas and beaches in their own countries?
[...]
They sat in a deflated silence for a few moments, then Fauzia said, She is not a tourist. She is a volunteer.
What’s the difference? Khadija said sneeringly. Volunteer! You see them in their big new cars, bringing us their goodwill. They should stay in their own country and do their goodwill there.

2.5 stars rounded to 2 as for a first post Nobel novel this is disappointing.

Thanks to the publisher via Netgalley for the ARC.

[Raluca Neacsu · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really loved how this story was told, the way the characters’ lives intertwined and shaped each other felt so profound and nuanced. I’m definitely going to explore more of Gurnah’s work. Completely mesmerized.

[Jill · Rating 5 out of 5]

Abdulrazak Gurnah won the Nobel Prize four years ago for his book Afterlives – a multi-generational novel about colonialism and war. This book – Theft – is far more intimate and accessible, but it is profound, nonetheless.

It’s not flashy nor does it show off in language, style, or even content. Even though it is understated, it is masterfully and confidently written and communicates important truths about our legacies and our trajectories – how we stumble, and how (in some cases) we right ourselves and settle into the life we are meant to lead.

Theft centers on three young people who live in Tanzania after colonial rule. The first is Karim, the son of a mother forced to marry an older, wealthy man. When Karim is three, she summons the courage to leave him, and Karim is raised by his grandparents. The second is Fauzia, a beautiful and bright teen who experienced “the falling sickness” as a child and worries about passing on that unwanted legacy. And finally, there’s Badar, who never really knew who he was. He was raised by impoverished relatives who saw it as their duty and eventually given away to serve in Karim’s mother’s household, despite a promising early education.

Of the three, Karim is the “star” – bright, charming, assertive, and unstoppable in pursuing the best life in a high government office. The other two fall into his trajectory. On a visit home, Karim meets Badar, notes his potential, and takes him under his wing. Fauzia chances upon Fauzia in school, and her beauty dazzles him. As the three lives intertwine, the true personalities and fates of the three begin to emerge.

A theft does take place, but only a few pages are devoted to it, and is resolved quickly. The “theft” of the title is far broader. Some of it refers to the arrogant and self-centered Western NGO workers and tourists who blithely wreak havoc on ordinary lives. But even more, the book focuses on the theft of innocence and the erosion of trust as the three protagonists confront betrayals and destiny. The satisfying resolution and the strong character-driven narrative are strong reasons for choosing this book.

[Sam Cheng · Rating 3 out of 5]

Gurnah divides Theft into three parts.

In part 1, Raya marries, leaves her husband with her son Karim, and moves to Dar es Saleem to live with Haji. Karim reads detective novels and does well in school, eventually studying geography and environmental studies at the University of Dar es Salaam. While Karim’s away for school, a man drops off a young teenage boy named Badar under his legal guardianship at Haji and Raya’s home. Badar becomes responsible for domestic duties, like cooking and caretaking. Haji’s father lives in the house, and he remains unwelcoming to Badar, speaking to him only in gestures. Unbeknownst to Badar, the adults negotiate this living accommodation because Haji’s father’s once cared for Badar’s biological father.

In part 2, Haji’s father accuses 17-year-old Badar of stealing food and kicks him out of their house. Haji finally reveals the family secret to Badar: his father, Ismael, is a relative of the family. He stole money from Haji’s father, left the family, and no one knows where Ismael is. Since then, Haji’s father paid Badar’s guardians to take care of Badar until the foster family decided the arrangement no longer suited them. Even though Badar did not steal food from Haji’s father, the older man can only see Ismael; he transfers his hurt and venomous disdain to Badar and evicts the young man.

In part 3, Badar starts his new life with Karim and Fauzia, Karim’s wife, in Zanzibar. Karim finds a job for Badar at the Tamarand Hotel. Badar lives with Karim and Fauzia in their small apartment until he saves money and settles into his flat. Soon after, Karim (25) and Fauzia (21) expect their first kid. Fauzia is hesitant because she suffered from epilepsy as a child and is afraid to pass this on, but Karim believes the spells are in the past and pushes to grow their family. Their daughter proves to be more work than Karim expects, and he swiftly transforms from a “kind lover to [an] exasperated father.” Karim has an affair with Gerry, a 21-year-old foreign aid from London and a temporary guest at Badar’s hotel. After Fauzia and Karim separate, Karim’s relationship with Badar falls apart. Not long after, Fauzia chooses Badar.

It took a minute for me to ascertain whose story or which stories Gurnah would focus on developing. He begins with Raya, transitions to Karim, and ultimately hard-shifting to Badar. I suspect he deliberately advances Theft with these surreptitious changes to create an effect in his story-telling, such as resemble life’s muddled narrative structure. It probably works because Gurnah’s character-driven novel plods along sedately; readers may less readily receive a different combination. I rate Theft 2.5 stars. I appreciate the story’s setting in Tanzania; for this reason, I would recommend Gurnah’s newest.

[Cristian · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.33

[Nailya · Rating 3 out of 5]

It sometimes feels like Abdulrazak Gurnah is one of the less hyped up recent Nobel Prize winners in the wider bookish community. His win did not get the same level of excitement as that of Han Kang, for example. It is a shame, as his work is excellent at capturing the often lost life of the Swahili Coast, Zanzibar and Dar es Salaam. I have only read Afterlives before this one and adored the storytelling inherent to Gurnah's writing style. Light on dialogue, playing fast and loose with time (weeks or months could pass between paragraphs or even between sentences), his writing has an almost mythical quality to it. He paints in quite broad strokes to create a sense of a place, a time and a people, but at his best, he also masterfully captures the people he writes about.

Theft displays some of the best qualities of his writing. It provides a panoramic view of postcolonial Zanzibar (and glimpses of Dar es Salaam). The sights, smells, and tactility of the places Gurnah visits are vividly recreated. The sense of time was a little bit distorted for me, as it seemed like around 20 years got lost in the narrative (the beginning read like the early 1960s, but the child born at the beginning of the story is then still of university age in the late 1990s). There was also very little specificity of postcolonial Tanzanian politics, little sense of any conflict around forging a national identity, which might have been a part of the point Gurnah is making. The ARC I have had some undeleted edits in it, which indicated that he really tried to create as timeless a story as possible (for example, replacing 'Googled' with 'looked up' when talking about the characters' interactions with the internet in the 2000/2010s) to try to avoid anything too specific. The interactions between the characters highlight the social structure and stratification of the merchant society at the heart of the narrative, creating some beautifully subtle moments.

Unfortunately, some of the things that don't quite work in such panoramic storytelling were also evident in the text. The pacing did not quite work for me. The first two-thirds of the novel set up the interpersonal conflicts of the last third. As a result, the setup feels too long, and the conflict and its resolution too rushed. The subtlety of the characters' emotions and feelings about each other descends into quite a banal and two-dimensional discord. What was the development of Karim's character about? Was Gurnah trying to say that most men are, in fact, disappointing? We sort of know that already.

A major theme in the last quarter of the novel is voyeurism, tourism, and the hypocrisy of the international development industrial complex. Whilst I completely agree with the ideas expressed here, the exploration presented by Gurnah felt derivative and unoriginal, as if he is jumping on the bandwagon rather than leading the conversation. The works of Imbolo Mbue (How Beautiful We Were), Tsitsi Dangarembga (This Mournable Body) and Monique Ilboudo (So Distant From My Life), among many others, explored these issues in much more detail and nuance, whilst also showcasing more innovative prose and narrative structure.

This novel felt quite old-fashioned, both in a good and in a bad way. If you want a captivating, almost lulling, broad stroke story that would transport you to a different land, definitely check it out.

[Amber · Rating 4 out of 5]

ARC gifted by the publisher

What I liked

- Gurnah writes imperfect characters with such compassion that even when they make stupid decisions I feel deeply for them

- themes of belonging and identity are weaved seamlessly into the storyline as the readers follow characters of different socioeconomic backgrounds. While this isn’t a new concept, Gurnah’s unique writing style vividly shows us the everyday struggles of the haves vs have nots, and how that affects one’s ability to take control of their destiny

- the novel follows three main characters thorough the years with alternating narratives. It doesn’t provide specific timeframes or character names in the beginning of each chapter, yet the author’s writing is clear enough that I never got confused. For a relatively short novel to achieve this kind of clarity with few words, it really showcases Gurnah’s craft

- for lovers of character-focused books who are turned off by purple prose, THEFT is a great option! I was expecting a novel filled with SAT words and melodramatic lit fic writing, but I was so pleasantly surprised!

What didn’t quite work for me

- the first half of the book moves rather slowly and I can see readers who dnf quickly might not make it to the interesting parts in time

[Ruben · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good book doesn't need to be innovative. This was my first novel by Abdulrazak Gurnah and I was invested in the story from the start. It was a much easier and more conventional read than I expected from a Nobel laureate, but intriguing all the same.

The book is set in Tanzania in the 1990s, as three main characters come of age. Talented and worldly Karim, worrisome Fauzia who suffers from falling sickness and poor, modest Badar who gradually becomes the central figure of the story and the three lives start to converge. The background is one of growing tourism and development, impacting society, values and ultimately very directly the lives of the three protagonists.

Works well on audio too as the story is simple enough and slow-paced.

[John Caleb Grenn · Rating 5 out of 5]

THEFT
Abdulrazak Gurnah

Thank you to @riverheadbooks for sharing this review copy with me!

This might be a perfect novel. I tend to like reading something that pushes the boundaries and leans out over the edge of the cliff a little bit, risking it all for something a little crazy. Here, I didn’t get that, and I am so so glad—THEFT is a perfectly balanced, terrifically paced, capital-N-Novel by a master. Gurnah doesn’t waste a word, but doesn’t spare details either. He lets his characters breathe, then broods them all back in before they wander too far, keeping them so close to the reader you can just about smell them, and close enough to each other the tension is always taut.

THEFT is one of those books, rich with characters who fly off the page in a swirl of letters and magically, majestically form into a real life person right there in front of you. Reading Gurnah felt like he was implanting a slow paced award winning movie inside your head and pushing play. Not just one life, but two, three, multiple fully realized main and secondary characters, straightforward precise language, this book felt like it was all meat, no fluff. No wonder this man won the Nobel Prize—when a book you write could have just as easily been written a hundred years ago or a hundred years from now, you know it’s a classic. I guess that’s what they mean by timeless.

THEFT is out and you don’t want to miss this exacting family drama that hits every note a fine literary novel should hit. I was in a bit of a slump, but this character driven novel pulled me right out. I loved it.

[Darryl Suite · Rating 3 out of 5]

It was a slow start, and by the end maybe a little too basic. But it was still a compelling enough read with interesting characters at the forefront. It's episodic and old-fashioned in style—ain't nothing wrong with that, just don't expect innovation. A slice of life look at post-colonial Tanzania. It's a solid read, but not one I especially warmed to.

Kinda get the feeling this wasn't the correct first book to start with by this Nobel Prize winning writer.

[Maria Ionela Dan · Rating 3 out of 5]

3,5

[Sintija Buhanovska · Rating 5 out of 5]

“Vai tu zini, kur nonāktu, ja ietu tūkstoš dienu? Otrā pasaules malā, un no turienes nevar atgriezties. Vai tu pazīsti kādu, kas būtu atgriezies no otras pasaules malas? Nu re!”
Izcils un ārkārtīgi daudzslāņains darbs, literāra pērle. Lēns stāsta ritējums, varoņu paralēlie stāstījumi, bet tajā pašā laikā spraigi notikumu pavērsieni. Lieluska iespēja iepazīt Tanzānijas kultūru, vēsturi, sociālpolitisko iekārtu, taču pats galvenais - paražas. Vārds “zādzība” šajā romānā tverts ļoti plaši no tā primārās nozīmes līdz identitātes, sapņu, iespēju, drošības un arī kultūras “zādzība. Noteikti iesaku izlasīt tiem, kurus nebaida augstvērtīga un “sveša” literatūra.

[Morgan · Rating 5 out of 5]

So soothing, so satisfying to be in the hands of a master of his craft. Such control over the sentences. Delicate power dynamics shifting between the characters. I loved this.

[thewanderingjew · Rating 5 out of 5]

Theft, Abdulrazak Gurnah, author; Ashley Zhangazha, narrator
First off, I loved the book, I loved the writing, but I was confused. There are so many characters that while I listened to the audio, I also needed a print copy to keep the story straight. While there are an abundance of characters, the novel revolves largely around only three.
Secondly, I have to confess that I was not very familiar with Zanzibar and I had to look it up to comprehend a bit of the geography and the landscape and the type of people that lived there. I love the fact that the book introduced me to a whole new part of the world and its customs, with its people and lifestyle, and illustrated how it contrasted with the more modern world. Still, no matter where one is, the human being is subject to weaknesses and strengths, honor and dishonor, loyalty and disloyalty, and the class distinctions that were very much in evidence as the characters Geraldine Bruno and Maria Caffrey interacted with Badar and Karim.
Karim, Badar and Fauzia are from Zanzibar. They are young and just setting out in life. Zanzibar is an Archipelago, or group of islands. It is part of the United Republic of Tanzania. The book guides us through their lives as they navigate opportunity and disadvantage, deprivation and abundance and the contrivances and circumstances that life threw at each of them. Although they experienced similar events in their lives, they each dealt with the travails quite differently. They each faced similar as well as different challenges and rose to the occasion with their own unique approach. What caused such differences as their three lives converged, as their characters developed and their needs were revealed? What caused their strengths and weaknesses?
In the case of Karim, around which much of the narrative revolves, we learn that his mother, Raya, was married to a much older man, Bakari Abbas, in an arranged marriage. She followed custom and respected her father’s wishes. When her husband became too difficult to live with, however, she left him, and took her son Karim with her. She returned to her childhood home to live with her parents. Raya did not enjoy motherhood. She leaned on her parents to help raise Karim who saw little of his father. He was often teased in school. She was often absent from his life and he yearned for her affection. Finally, one day, she actually moved out of the home and left him in the care of his grandparents. When his grandmother died, and his grandfather was very demanding and also ill, Karim’s half-brother Ali, a decade older, rescued him and took him into his home.
Ali had a different mother, Mamkuu, but they had the same father. Mamkuu had divorced Bakari Abbas before Raya became his second wife. Ali’s wife, Jalila, was very kind to Karim. She was not much older than him, but she took him under her wing, stepping into his life in place of his mother. Meanwhile, his mother had been having an affair with Haji Othman. When they got married, Haji, a jovial man, took to Karim as if he was his own son. Karim was rarely surly then and was successful in school. When he returned home from university, he obtained a good job, was upwardly mobile and everyone was so proud of him, but not as proud as he was of himself. His self-confidence was growing, and perhaps, he was growing a little smug, as well. Would this smugness grow into arrogance?
Then we have Fauzia. When she was an infant, she suffered from the falling sickness. It never recurred, and today she has no episodes. Her mother, Khadija, is still always wondering if it will return or if it can be passed on to future children. She is, therefore, overly zealous about Fauzia’s welfare and always has been. Khadija and Musa, her father, dote upon her. Fauzia has one really close friend called Hawa, who is her confidant. Surprisingly, they are not alike. Fauzia is quiet and Hawa is very outgoing. Fauzia loves school and wants to become a teacher. Hawa thinks she is foolish because she could be so much more, but she is determined to teach.
When Fauzia and Karim pass each other, they discover that there is a magnetic attraction. Hawa notices it too. Soon, they find ways to meet often, and they fall in love. Because of her previous illness, Fauzia’s parents are relieved that someone wishes to marry her. However, her parents truly want her happiness, above all, and Fauzia seems ecstatic, as does Karim. Hawa, her dear friend, is not so certain that she should marry or have children, since she views it as a prison of sorts. Will Fauzia discover that Karim has a selfish side prone to anger? Will it be a prison?
Now enter Badar Ismail. He was not raised by his real mother and father. His mother died of cholera and his father abandoned him with her relatives. Mohammed Rashidi went to see the Othman’s who were relatives also, but Uncle Othman would not take in the child because of what his father, Ismail, had done. He had turned him out of his home, when he had stolen from him. So, Uncle Othman made an arrangement to pay the Rashidis to raise Badar. It was a difficult environment for Badar, and he was often treated cruelly by other members of the family. However, he was of good temperament and was obedient. He accepted whatever life threw at him with a good nature, even when falsely accused. Although he was often bullied, he never became a bully. The years passed. When Badar was almost 14, his “father”, Mohammed, said he could no longer afford to send him to school, and he brought him back to the home of Raya and Haji Othman, Karim’s mother and step-father. Badar Ismail, who was Haji’s distant relative, was now to be a servant in their home. His “father” left him there with no explanation and never looked back. Still, Badar remained respectful to him and those around him. He held his tongue when necessary and did as he was told. Raya and Haji were kind to him, but Uncle Othman, Haji’s father, could not forgive him for being Ismail’s son.
The story moves on when Karim meets Badar. He takes to him right away. Eventually, when Badar is falsely accused of stealing and is being sent away again, Karim, remembers what his brother Ali did for him. He offered to rescue Badar, and he brought him into his own home.
Karim and Fauzia were very kind to Badar but they lacked privacy, and it was not easy. Soon they found a place for him to live and he also got a job. He was content, in his own way and made the best of his situation. He proved to be very trustworthy. He remained close to Karim and Fauzia. Then Fauzia had a daughter, Nasra. The atmosphere in their home changed. Karim was impatient and unable to stand the noise or demands of a child. Badar, however, had a natural gift and could often calm the crying child simply by picking her up and cradling her in his arms, softly cooing to her. This did not go unnoticed. Karim grew more and more disenchanted with his life. He was no longer the center of attraction for Fauzia, and he had little peace or affection. Their relationship began to change along with his growing discontent and anger.
In the novel we witness selfishness and arrogance, compassion and kindness, tolerance and intolerance, fidelity and infidelity, smugness and humility, elitism and egalitarianism, and a host of other character traits along with the behavior that goes along with them. The class divide was front and center in the lives of all of the characters, minor and major, as some stations and positions in life were admired and some looked down upon.
As the lives of the characters converged and as they faced each challenge and outrage that confronted them, they reacted in different ways to solve similar problems or handle their moments of success. What was it that led to a particular reaction, for instance, to bullying, to children, to abandonment, to cruelty, to lies, to temptation, to failure, to success, to disappointment, to love, to suspicion, etc.? Musa’s reaction to a difficult child and Karim’s reactions were polar opposites and one has to wonder why? Ali’s kindness remained constant, in contrast with Karim’s, to the needs of a “brother”. Why did Karim’s personality so drastically change from what he seemed at first? Did he grow to think his success made him better and more deserving than others? Did Fauzia change? Did marriage become her prison?
Theft was a recurring theme in so many of their lives. In addition to the common idea of theft, what about the theft of the possibilities in life that circumstances cause? The lack of an education robs one of a certain kind of future. An unhappy marriage robs a child of two parents, an accident sometimes robs one of life as does a serious illness, a lack of opportunity robs one of future prospects, and these can all be considered theft. Badar’s father was a thief who was forced out of the Othman’s home. Then Badar was falsely accused of thievery and forced to move from there as well, though they knew he was innocent. Karim was falsely accused of theft but he was guilty of infidelity which robbed his child of his presence in his life. Geraldine’s behavior robbed Fauzia of her husband. False accusations rob those who are accused of their dignity and respect.
In the end, who is better off, the character who learned not to be afraid or the one who learned to endure? Who was better able to cope? Who was happier, the one driven by material success or the one driven by personal success? Are any of us better than another by virtue of anything other than character?
This author has painted a picture of these characters so well, that they existed in the theater of my mind. I could see them as clearly as if they were on stage in each scene, playing their roles.

[Lucian · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.10/5.00

I'm on the fence about this one. While the theft theme is ample and omnipresent throughout the entire book, I'm not sure about the execution. Maybe it's Abdulrazak's style, or the way it was intended to be written because of Badar's lack of education, or just me expecting more from a Nobel prize winner.

I'll sleep on it for a while; it has a chance of turning into a 4* down the line.

Edit: 7th of Oct - It will stay as a 3*, checking back at it now, I realized that most of the book escapes me. I'll take it as that warrants it to stay where I've originally rated it.

[Joy D · Rating 4 out of 5]

Set in Zanzibar and Dar es Salaam, this novel focuses on the lives of three characters: Karim, Badar, and Fauzia. The storyline provides back stories for each, and the ways their lives come together. It is about ordinary individuals who are greatly impacted by their circumstances, the kindness or cruelty of the people they meet, their own decisions, and their nuclear families. It will appeal to those who enjoy character-driven stories that are slow-paced and deliberately developed.

The book provides commentary on Tanzania’s patriarchal society, class hierarchies, and capitalistic temptations and exploitations. There are many Tanzanian cultural details that add depth. It is a beautifully written novel that provides an intimate portrait of three individuals with interconnected lives. I particularly enjoyed the writing style, interpersonal dynamics, and sense of place.

[Cameron Rosen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Such a delicate and beautiful book. I could taste it, visually- the characters, setting and plot were so clear. The ability to introduce new characters throughout the book that were interwoven into the plot so seamlessly is so impressive.

Im going to write more tomorrow need to sleep on it.

OKAYYY- someone in the comments @John Caleb wrote that Gurnah allowed his characters to really breath and that’s what I slept on last night, each character (major and minor) felt like the decision making was happening autonomously from the author. Which is a unique feat for a writer to accomplish.

One of my favorite things about reading is it allows an inside glimpse into other cultures, this was my first book set in Tanzania/ Zanzibar and the dynamic between the new modern generation of children vs the elders was super interesting to read about. The tourism and gloabilization aspect of the book grow overtime and are not overt themes in the readers face- but are poignant nonetheless.

Overall I freaking loved this book!

[City Elf Reader (Ryan)]

DNF @ 65%

I was intrigued and then I wasn’t. Unfortunate as the writing was really well done. I just couldn’t keep my focus and after making it to part 3 I didn’t care to finish.

Thank you to the publisher for the finished copy.

[adelina gabriela · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5*

[Aleksandra Gratka · Rating 4 out of 5]

Zawsze z dużym zainteresowaniem sięgam po dzieła noblistów. Literacki Nobel to przecież wyżyny, talent i dorobek. Czasem odczuwam zachwyt, czasem zdziwienie, czasem bezradność.

"Kradzież" to moje drugie spotkanie z Abdulrazakiem Gurnahem. Pierwsze - "Powróceni" - pozostawiło mnie obojętną wobec stylu i tematu. Liczyłam, że z "Kradzieżą" będzie inaczej. Do połowy nie było.
Trudno pisać O CZYM jest to powieść. Chyba najbezpieczniej - o relacjach. Zanim dotrzemy do teoretycznie głównych bohaterów, Karima i Fauzii, poznajemy wcześniejsze pokolenie. Aranżowane małżeństwo, przemoc, niezrozumienie, kobieta, której głos się nie liczy. Miłość? A co to takiego? Gdy jednak kobieta postanawia walczyć o siebie, sprzeciwia się opresyjnej tradycji, może odmienić swój los.
Małżeństwo Karima ma inne podwaliny. On sam jest inny, wydaje się, że dobry i uczciwy. Obserwujemy jego losy, a w tle współczesną Tanzanię, z ofertą turystyczną, wolontariuszami, brakiem perspektyw, a czasem z całym wachlarzem tychże.
Tytułowa kradzież? Nieoczywista. Dosłownie pojawia się pod koniec, a i tak jest dyskusyjna. Metaforycznie? Wiele tu kradzieży. Kradzież marzeń, spokoju, męża...

Proza Gurnaha sprawia wrażenie płynącej rzeki, której odcinek widzimy, a przecież dalej są kolejne zakręty. Weszłam w środek opowieści, a koniec książki wcale nie wydaje się końcem historii.

Gurnah nie będzie moim ulubionym pisarzem, ale odsłonił przede mną tajemnice Tanzanii, świata zupełnie mi obcego. Jakoś mnie tym ujął.

[Hibak Iman · Rating 5 out of 5]

an east african nobel prize winner who is exceptionally talented and well regarded wrote this book? sign me up!! i’ve instantly fell in love with Gurnah’s writing and will be reading more of his books. i loved this book so much! and it’s one of those books that remind you how much you love your favourite genre which in my case is Literary Fiction.
this book set in Tanzania, Zanzibar and Dar es Salaam, was an intricate tale of lives of three young people, Karim, Badar, and Fauzia in postcolonial Tanzania and their lives slowly intersect and tangle.
The reasons why I loved this book:

the emotional pressure of this book!!! there weren’t any dramatic emotions that hit you right in the face, its quiet intense. not overly sentimental. but the emotions just seep through you and builds up over the book. which is extraordinary writing!!!!

the title theft itself as a theme, it’s not object theft. but the moral debts we owe eachother? the tension between generosity and control.

morally grey characters? the characters are flawed, and how human they are, and how complex it is, the impulses.

i also loved that this is my first book set in tanzania and one thing i love about literary fiction is that it feels like i’ve visited the place through the book. and i loved visiting tanzania 🩷

[Dee Turner · Rating 5 out of 5]

IMAGE: STONETOWN OF ZANZIBAR, TANZANIA from UNESCO's World Heritage Site (from a gallery of 32)

Ok, I admit I was exhausted after reading Muir's GIDEON THE NINTH AND HARROW THE NINTH, which contained wonderfully strange worlds and was brilliantly drafted, with a zillion words I didn't know but doggedly researched. This novel is simply written but so deeply understanding of human nature--and so deeply sympathetic. Gurnah won the Nobel Prize in Literature for not one book but ALL of his books, in 2021, and although this was my first I fully intend to read them all. This one is not long and I recommend it as a great first start.

THEFT takes place in Tanzania, specifically in Zanzibar and on the mainland city of Dar es Salaam, during the 1980s, 1990s, and 2000s, a period of significant social and political change driven by the rise of tourism and new technology.

I love reading novels that inform me of distant places and their histories, and as every place name is mentioned, I put down my ereader and pick up my phone to find photos. Although I'm disabled, I've been able travel the world this way.

Be sure, when looking up Zanzibar, to notice it's on an island in an archipelago. Look in world historical sites for photos of "Stone Town," a city within the city dating back a thousand years and typical of the period for coastal trading towns of the silk, spices, and slave trades. Its city of stone depicts narrow, winding streets that show influences from Africa, Arabia, India, and Europe.

Highly recommend, especially for you to look up photos!

[Samuel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Actually really enjoyed this, looking forward to reading this author’s other books.

[Oskars Kaulēns · Rating 4 out of 5]

izrādās, nozagt var ne tikai to, kas tiek uzraudzīts pavirši, bet arī to, kas tiek apzināti sargāts un nocietināts. tā tev nav nekāda Luvra Parīzē, ko var aplaupīt gaišā dienas laikā visu acu priekšā.