Winners of second Katara Prize for Arabic Novel named

DOHA: A historical novel inspired by an important yet neglected period in Egyptian history has won the nod of the jury to bag the top honour at the second Katara Prize for Arabic Novel.
“Al Azbakia’ by Egyptian novelist Nasser Iraq bagged the $200,000 prize for Drama in published category during the awards ceremony held at the conclusion of the Katara Arab Novel Festival on Wednesday at the Opera House. Set during the French invasion of Egypt led by Napoleon Bonaparte in 1798, the novel chronicles seven years of tumult combining real and imaginary characters.
“I chose this period because it was the most dangerous in modern Egyptian history — a very important moment yet neglected to some extent. During this period Egyptians were exposed to tremendous turbulence; six governors ruled the country — two of whom were killed,” said Iraq.
When the idea of the novel came to mind, the Dubai-based writer immersed himself to the concept of reading nearly 50 books. On top of the monetary award, the novel is set to be turned into a dramatic piece as well as translated to several languages promising great international exposure.
“Winning this prize and translating it to drama is something very special and important to me. The Katara Prize for Arabic Novel plays a crucial role in promoting Arab culture and enhancing Arab creativity. It encourages the new generation of novelists and honours those that came before them. It contributes to spreading Arab culture internationally through translation,” he said.
The prize has cemented a strong position in the region’s literary map in fostering the presence of Arab novel globally, encouraging and supporting creative Arab novelists and attracting further interest in the Arab narrative.
During the awards ceremony Katara General Manager Dr Al Khalid bin Ibrahim Al Sulaiti presented to Abdullah Ahmad Mohareb, Head of Arab League Educational, Cultural and Scientific Organization (ALECSO) Katara’s initiative to mark October 13 as Arabic Novel Day. Ali Ahmad Al Rifai won the top prize of $100,000 for the unpublished category for his novel “Mero Family genes”.
The top five awardees for published novel category included Ibrahim Nasr Allah (Kilmanjaro Souls), IlyasKhori (Sons of Gitto), Eman Hamedan (Fifty grams of heaven), Nasser Iraq (al Azbakia), and Yahia Yakhalf (Wind rider). They will each be awarded $60,000. In the unpublished category the winners were Salmi Al Nasser- (Blue tongues), Saad Mohamed Raheem (Desire banks), Ali Ahmad Al Rifai (Mero Family genes), Mohamed Al Gharbi Omran (Heights queen), and Mostafa Al Hamdawi (princess shadows). Each of them will receive
$30,000.
Katara’s prizes for research and studies went to Dr Ibrahim Al Hajri, Dr. Hassan Al Mowadn, Dr HossamSafan, Dr ZohorKaram and Dr Mohamed Abo Azza.
The top five unpublished studies in the research, evaluation and literary criticism category will each be awarded $15,000, while, the top five in the unpublished young-adult novels category will each be awarded $10,000.
For this edition, Katara received a total of 1,004 entries, which was split into three major categories: unpublished novels (732), published novels (234), and literary criticism (38).
It covered a wide literary geography with 375 submissions from Egypt and Sudan, 260 from Iraq and the Levant, 257 from northern Arab African countries, 105 from the GCC countries and Yemen and 7 from non-Arab countries.
The second edition of the Katara Arabic Novel Festival comprised events and activities focused on the latest in Arab narrative including panel discussions in addition to three concurrent exhibitions namely Youth Novel, Naguib Mahfouz, and Pens› Collectibles.
The Pens Collectibles expo displayed a wide collection of pens and writing instruments that belong to renowned writers, in addition to 24 mural paintings inspired by their novels.
Dignitaries and renowned novelists, intellectuals, and the jury members attended the awards ceremony.