Tahir Hamut

Tahir Hamut Izgil is a modernist Uyghur poet, filmmaker, and author. A leader in avant-garde Uyghur poetry in the 1990s, he is known for poems and films strongly influenced by Uyghur life. Originally from Xinjiang, he is currently living in exile in the United States. His experiences as an intellectual during the rounding up of Uyghurs and his emigration to the west is described in his memoir Waiting to Be Arrested at Night, published in 2023.