Arifa Akbar

Arifa Akbar is a British journalist and critic, born in London to a family who spent part of her early childhood trying to resettle in Pakistan before returning to north London in 1977. She graduated from the University of Edinburgh and joined The Independent in 2001 as a news reporter, rising to arts correspondent and then literary editor. She later worked for Unbound and Tortoise Media, and in 2019 became chief theatre critic of The Guardian. Her first book, Consumed: A Sister's Story (2021), a memoir of her older sister Fauzia, who died of tuberculosis in 2016, was shortlisted for the Costa Biography Award and the Jhalak Prize.

Timeline of Arifa Akbar’s life

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Prizes