Wednesday, January 18, 2017

Longlist, judges and dates announced for International Prize for Arabic Fiction 2017


www.arabicfiction.org | #ArabicFiction2017

The International Prize for Arabic Fiction (IPAF) has today, Monday 16 January 2017, revealed the longlist of 16 novels in contention for the 2017 prize. The novels selected were chosen from 186 entries from 19 countries, all published within the last 12 months. The longlist was chosen by a panel of five judges chaired by Palestinian novelist Sahar Khalifa.

Of the 16 authors chosen, many are recognisable names with three having been shortlisted for the Prize previously – Mohammed  Hasan Alwan, Sinan Antoon and Amir Tag Elsir­ – and a further five previously longlisted – Renée Hayek, Ismail Fahd Ismail, Abdul-Kareem Jouaity, Elias Khoury and Mohammed Abdel Nabi. Their repeated recognition by the Prize demonstrates the enduring quality of their writing.

Yassin Adnan, although a well-known poet, makes his first appearance on the list with his debut novel, Hot Maroc. Meanwhile, Sultan Al Ameemi began writing his longlisted book, One Room Is Not Enough, at the 2014 Nadwa – an annual writing workshop for talented, emerging writers that is supported by the Prize. Other Nadwa attendees on the list include Ali Ghadeer and Mohammed Hasan Alwan, who is the youngest writer to be selected. This year’s successful authors represent 10 countries across the Arab world and range in age from 37 to 76.
The full 2017 longlist, with author names in alphabetical order, is as follows:

Author
Title
Country of origin
Publisher
Yassin Adnan
Hot Maroc
Morocco
Dar al-Ain
Sultan Al Ameemi
One Room Is Not Enough
UAE
Difaf Publishing
Mohammed Hasan Alwan
A Small Death
Saudi Arabia
Dar Al Saqi
Sinan Antoon
Index
Iraq
Al-Jamal
Najwa Binshatwan
The Slaves' Pens
Libya
Dar Al Saqi
Amir Tag Elsir
The Resort of the Enchantress
Sudan
Dar Al Saqi
Ali Ghadeer
Swastika
Iraq
Dar wa Maktabat Sutur

Renée Hayek
The Year of the Radio
Lebanon
Dar Tanweer, Lebanon
Zuheir al-Hiti
Days of Dust
Iraq
Dar Tanweer, Tunis
Ismail Fahd Ismail
Al-Sabiliat
Kuwait
Nova
Abdul-Kareem Jouaity
The North Africans
Morocco
Al-Markez al-Thaqafi al-Arabi
Tayseer Khalf
The Slaughter of the Philosophers
Syria
Arabic Scientific Institute for Research and Publishing
Elias Khoury
Children of the Ghetto – My Name is Adam
Lebanon
Dar al-Adab
Mohammed Abdel Nabi
In the Spider's Chamber
Egypt
Dar al-Ain
Saad Mohammed Rahim
The Bookseller's Murder
Iraq
Dar wa Maktabat Sutur

Youssef Rakha
Paolo
Egypt
Dar Tanweer, Egypt

The 2017 judges are: Sahar Khalifa (Chair), a Palestinian novelist; Saleh Almani, a Palestinian translator; Fatima al-Haji, a Libyan academic, novelist and broadcaster; Sahar ElMougy, an Egyptian novelist and academic; and Sophia Vasalou, a Greek academic and translator.
The 2017 Chair of Judges Sahar Khalifa comments on the longlist:

‘We chose the longlist of 16 from 186 novels submitted for the International Prize for Arabic Fiction. The longlist novels are hugely varied in their subject matter and imagined worlds, embracing history, political and social themes and fantasy. As a whole they express the interactions, struggles and defeats, as well as the hopes and dreams, of the Arab world today.’


This is the tenth year of the Prize, which is recognised as the leading prize for literary fiction in the Arab world. 

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