The Near and Middle Eastern Department at the University Library is delighted to present a new book display celebrating the 2025 International Prize for Arabic Fiction (IPAF). Located in the East Asian Reading Room of the Aoi Pavilion, the display features the six shortlisted novels, including this year’s winning title, Salat al-Qalaq (The Prayer of Anxiety) by Mohamed Samir Nada (Egypt), alongside titles from the 2025 longlist. The display also includes some of the previous year’s nominees and winners including some translations.

 

The IPAF, often referred to as the “Arabic Booker,” is the most prestigious literary prize in the Arab world. It supports and rewards contemporary Arabic fiction, and several past nominees have gone on to receive international recognition through English translation.

 

This display offers a broader look at contemporary Arabic literary voices. With themes ranging from personal memory and political struggle to poetic explorations of identity and place, the novels offer an accessible and richly varied window into Arabic literature today.

We invite all library users to visit the display, browse the books, and discover new stories from across the Arabic-speaking world. The display will be available to view for the next few weeks.

For more information, or if you’d like to explore these works further, please contact Ayman Abuawwad, Near and Middle Eastern Department: near_eastern@lib.cam.ac.uk

Titles shortlisted for the 2025 International Prize for Arabic Fiction:

• al-Masīḥ al-Andalusī / Taysīr Khalaf. (Syrian Egyptian)
• Dānishmand : riwāyah / Aḥmad Fāl al-Dīn. (Mauritanian)
• Malmas al-ḍawʼ : riwāyah / Nādiyah al-Najjār. (UAE)
• Mīthāq al-nisāʼ : riwāyah / Ḥanīn al-Ṣāyigh. (Lebanon)
• Wādī al-farāshāt. riwāyah / Azʹhar Jirjīs = The butterfly valley / Azher Jirjees. (Iraq)

Ayman Abuawwad

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