International Prize for Arabic Fiction 2026 Longlist Announced

Here are the African writers on the longlist of the International Prize for Arabic Fiction 2026, announced on Monday, December 15, 2025.

The International Prize for Arabic Fiction rewards excellence in contemporary Arabic creative writing while encouraging the readership of high-quality Arabic literature through the translation and publication of winning and shortlisted novels in other major languages. Previous winners include Bahaa Taher (2008), Yusuf Zeydan (2009), Abdo Khal (2010), Mohammed Achaari (2011), Rabee Jaber (2012), Saud Alsanousi (2013), Ahmed Saadawi (2014), Shukri Mabkhout (2015), Rabai al-Madhoun (2016), Mohammed Hasan Alwan (2017), Ibrahim Nasrallah (2018), Hoda Barakat (2019), Mohamed Alnaas (2022), and Basim Khandaqji (2024).

The 2026 edition began with the selection of a longlist from 137 submitted novels by a five-member judging panel chaired by Tunisian researcher and critic Mohamed Elkadhi. The panel also includes Palestinian writer and translator Maya Abu Al-Hayyat, Bahraini academic and critic Dheya Alkaabi, South Korean academic Laila Hyewon Baek, and Iraqi writer and translator Shakir Nouri.

Mohamed Elkadhi, Chair of the 2026 judges, said: “The novels included in this year’s longlist are a microcosm of the contemporary Arab literary scene in all its richness and variety. Many of the novels turn inward, exploring the private worlds of distinctive and unforgettable characters experiencing psychological crises and struggling to adapt to lived reality. History, too, figures prominently in works that evoke the recent or distant past with striking immediacy, probing its reverberations in the present. Questions of identity also recur, framed against the backdrop of war, conflict, migration, revolution, and the uneven rhythms of social and urban change. While some writers adopt realism and classical structures, a greater number blur the boundaries between the real and the extraordinary. Their narratives employ multiple narrators, streams of consciousness, and fragmented structures to reflect the relativity of the universe. Digging deep into the human psyche, they portray the pain suffered by those who feel isolated and alienated from reality, as they strive to uncover a truth distinct to that commonly accepted, moving in the orbits of the repressed and the unspoken.”

Here are the African writers in the running.

• The Origin of Species, Ahmad Abdulatif, (Egypt), Hayat Publications
• Grandma Touma’s Cord, Abdelouahab Aissaoui, (Algeria), Tashkeel
• Days of the Murdered Fatimid, Nizar Chakroun, (Tunisia), Dar Safsafa
• The Solitude of the Kangaroo, Abdelsalem Ibrahim, (Egypt), Tanmia
• A Cloud Above My Head, Doaa Ibrahim, (Egypt), Dar al-Ain
• I Resist the River’s Course, Said Khatibi, (Algeria), Hachette Antoine
• In the Labyrinths of Mr. F N, Abdelmajid Sebbata, (Morocco), Al-Markez al-Thaqafi al-Arabi
• Siesta Dream, Amin Zaoui, (Algeria), Dar al-Ain
• Hiding in a Hamster Wheel, Essam El Zayaat, (Egypt), Dar Dawen

The winner will be announced in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, on Thursday, April 9, 2026.