The American University in Cairo Press announced on Saturday, August 30th, the shortlist for its prestigious Naguib Mahfouz Prize for Literature. The prize is awarded every two years in honor of Naguib Mahfouz (1911-2006), the most famous Egyptian writer of the modern age and a recipient of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1988. Mahfouz published over thirty novels and hundreds of short stories. Some of his most famous works include The Cairo Trilogy (Thulāthiyyat al-Qāhira) and The Children of the Alley(Awlād Ḥāratnā), the latter of which was banned for a time and factored into an assassination attempt on Mahfouz in 1994 by religious fanatics. 

In reading his Nobel acceptance speech today, I found these words particularly moving: 

You may be wondering: This man coming from the third world, how did he find the peace of mind to write stories? You are perfectly right. I come from a world laboring under the burden of debts whose paying back exposes it to starvation or very close to it. Some of its   people perish in Asia from floods, others do so in Africa from famine. In South Africa millions have been undone with rejection and with deprivation of all human rights in the age of human rights, as though they were not counted among humans. In the West Bank and Gaza there are people who are lost in spite of the fact that they are living on their own land; land of their fathers, grandfathers and great grandfathers. They have risen to demand the first right secured by primitive man; namely, that they should have their proper place recognized by others as their own. They were paid back for their brave and noble move – men, women, youths and children alike – by the breaking of bones, killing with bullets, destroying of houses and torture in prisons and camps. Surrounding them are 150 million Arabs following what is happening in anger and grief. This threatens the area with a disaster if it is not saved by the wisdom of those desirous of a just and comprehensive peace.

Yes, how did the man coming from the Third World find the peace of mind to write stories? Fortunately, art is generous and sympathetic. In the same way that it dwells with the happy ones it does not desert the wretched. It offers both alike the convenient means for expressing what swells up in their bosom.

The entire speech can be read here.

The shortlist for the prize this year is the following:

The Sky is Smoking Cigarettes (al-Sama’ tudakhin al-saga’ir) by Wajdi al-Ahdal (Yemen)

The Glass Woman (al-Sayyida al-zujajiya) by Amr El-Adly (Egypt)

The Scribe: Abu Hayyan al-Tawhidi(al-Warraq Abu Hayyan al-Tawhidi) by Hisham Eid (Egypt)

My Name is Zayzafun (Ismi Zayzafun) by Sausan Jamil Hasan (Syria)

House of the Judge: The Journey of Qassim bin Yunis (Bayt al-qadi: masirat Qasim bin Yunis) by Mahmoud Adel Taha (Egypt)

Muted Microphone (Micrufun katim sawt) by Mohammed Tarazi (Lebanon).

More information about these works can be found here. The winner will have their book translated into English by AUC Press. The list of past recipients of the prize is a great resource for deeper encounters with modern Arabic literature in translation.

All the very best,