Interview
‘Writing is exactly like love – you need to do it in the dark’: novelist Leila Slimani on starting a new chapter in her life
Now in residence at the Madrid Prado, the author talks about its dark, inspirational Goyas, the clandestine nature of her writing – and why she finally wrote about her jailed then posthumously exonerated father
27 May 2026
It is a bright, chilly spring morning in Madrid, and the Museo del Prado doesn’t open to the public for another hour. Without the crowds, the museum is amorphous and eerily silent. A pale light pools in the corners and casts long shadows around the paintings, as if the figures inside them have slipped quietly into the room. It is here that I meet the French-Moroccan writer Leïla Slimani, who has spent the past two weeks using the space as inspiration for her work.
