mohsin: yeah, it was.at i had of wanting to write about race and identity, and it had been sitting in the back of my mind for many years. but i needed, i guess, a novelistic way into the idea. jeffrey: he would write a kind of fable, with the provocative title, the last white man, in which people in an unnamed place begin to wake up transformed. mohsin: one thing that the arts and writing gets to do is to remind us that we're sort of making up things as we go along, that reality isn't as real as we might imagine it to be. and that something like race, which you might think of as an actual objective real thing, is an imagined phenomenon. and because it's imagined, it can be re-imagined. the book is about the loss of something. jeffrey: the 51 year old hamid, whom i met recently in new york, has lived between countries and cultures, what he refers to as a "hybridized" life -- born into a punjabi family in lahore, pakistan, he spent part of his childhood in california, where his father studied for a phd at st

mohsin hamid, thank you very much. hamid: tha you. judy: and that's the newshour for tonight.ff. for all of us at the pbs newshour, thank you, please stay safe and we'll see you soon. [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy.] >> major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by -- >> keeper, mentor, they tailor advice to help you live your life. life, well-planned. >> carnegie corporation of new york supporting and -- innovations in education, democratic engagement and the international peace and security. the target foundation, committed to advancing racial equity and creating the change required to ship systems accelerate equitable economic opportunity. the ongoing support of these institutions. this program was made possible for the pope -- for the corporate ration of public broadcasting and the contributions pbs stations from viewers like you. thank you. ♪ this is the pbs newshour from w eta studios in washington and in the west from the walter cronkite school of journalism from arizona sta

the very reason we have writers such as, you know, mohsin hamid, zadie smith, monica ali, vikram setht because of the influence of rushdie. that is why midnight's children won the booker prize, twice, in fact, three times when it was voted for the best of bookers in 2008. that's what i think is really important. as an indian—born british—american i don't use this word lightly, he really did bring a unique angle on things, midnight's children, you mentioned, talking about things like partition, in particular. tell us about the richness and the breadth of rushdie�*s work. i think he gives english literature a new voice, and we could call it, use the word, a diasporic voice, an embodied voice. that new voice was notjust a displacement of the authority of the old voice, the urbane british voice of writers like somerset maugham or george orwell or graham greene, rushdie really invents a writing that dispenses with authority itself, notjust a particular authority. and i think that's what makes him so important for the development of the novel. it's not a new voice, really it's more than tha

divorce >> prosecutor fox then asked the witness mohsin the defendant barb's funeral. >> i overheardompany? it just didn't sound good. because the phone conversation i had with barb, and then now her death. >> michael george, a one-time insurance salesman himself, received $130,000 tax free from his life's life insurance policy. not bad money 1990. >> a witness who worked with michael in the insurance policy asked about the money. >> when is that there? >> it's a claim statement for a payment of the proceeds. >> who signed the claim? >> michael george, it looks like. >> i want day? >> 7:18 of 90. >> july 18th of 1990? >> are you aware that barbara is buried on july 17th, of 1990. >> womanizer, scoundrel. the prosecution dissected his character, and referred to him as the only possible killer. >> our concentration was to show that he was the only guy. that he was the one who had had to have done, it because no one else would've. >> speak loudly, your first name is kim. >> prosecutors call this woman -- i witnessed 30 to 35 arguments. >> she testified, she heard many heated arguments b