Dissident Libyan playwright and novelist Mansour Bushnaf started his literary career in the 1970s; his twenty plays have been performed and read across Libya. He was imprisoned for twelve years by the Gaddafi regime for his play When the Rats Govern. His first novel, Chewing Gum, was published in Cairo in 2008 and translated into English in 2014 and French in 2017, but remains banned in Libya.