Winners of the Sheikh Zayed Book Awards

Winners of the awards in eight categories are to receive Dh750,000 each. A winner for a ninth category, the Dh1 million Cultural Personality of the Year Award, has not yet been announced.

Contribution to the Development of Nations Award

Saeed Al Soyan, The Epic of Human Evolution

The judges chose Mr Al Soyan’s work because it covered “a large spectrum of notions in the field of social sciences”. The book develops the theory of evolution beyond biology, looking at it socially, culturally, linguistically and economically.

It also “fills the gap” in anthropological studies in Arab academia, the organisers said.

Mr Al Soyan, born in Al Unayza in Saudi Arabia in 1944, received a PhD in anthropology, folklore and Oriental studies from the University of California, Berkeley. He is a professor at King Saud University, and has researched topics including Nabati poetry and oral tradition.

Children’s Literature Award

Jawdat Fakhreddine, Thirty Poems for Children

Mr Fakhreddine’s poetry collection contained insight and a unique layout with illustrations that earned him the prize in this category. The book “manifests simplicity in language and beauty of rhythms” and stimulates positive thinking and imagination, the judges found.

Mr Fakhreddine, born in Al Sultaniya, Lebanon, in 1953, has published poetry and books including Rural Illusions, Staying Away From Your Love, Vision Has a Time and Scared Poems. His background is in both physics and literature, and he has been a professor of literature and criticism at Lebanese University for almost 20 years.

Young Author Award

Rami Abu Shihab, Permanence and Deception: Post-Colonial Discourse in Contemporary Arab Criticism

The book appealed to judges because of the author’s understanding and awareness of studies from the post-colonial era. He also sampled contemporary Arab criticism in a unique way, organisers said, and examined post-colonial studies terminology and doctrine.

Mr Abu Shihab is the youngest winning author, born in Zarqa, Jordan, in 1974. He has a doctorate degree in modern literary criticism from the Institute of Arab Research and Studies in Cairo, and now works as teacher and lecturer at the Qatar Foundation for Education, Science and Community Development.

He contributes articles to several newspapers, including The National’s sister Arabic newspaper, Al Ittihad. Mr Abu Shihab also authored a poetry collection titled Gentlemen, I Have Returned After a Short Death.

Translation Award

Mohammed Al Mansouri, Housing the Stranger in the Mediterranean World

Mr Al Mansouri, professor at Tunisian University and University of Dammam in Saudi Arabia, won for his translation from English to Arabic of this historical look at hotels in the region by Olivia Remie Constable.

The judges found that it maintained the integrity of the original language and terminology.

Mr Al Mansouri called the award an “honour” and said he thought the book explored an important topic, looking at these economic institutions that hosted travellers, students and strangers from the 1500s. He valued the research in it as part of his own research as a historian.

He called the book an “incentive for youth to conduct research”.

Mr Al Mansouri is professor of Middle Ages and Byzantine history, and was born in Siliana, Tunisia in 1955.

Literature Award

Abdel Rasheed Mahmoudi, After Coffee

Mr Mahmoudi’s 2013 novel looking at a village in his country in the 1940s mixed classical language with simple dialogue from the characters.

An Egyptian critic and writer, Mr Mahmoudi received his doctorate in Middle East studies from the University of Manchester in the UK. He previously published books including Taha Hussein: From Al-Azhar to the Sorbonne and Lord Shaaban, a collection of short stories.

He also published translations of My Philosophical Development by British philosopher Bertrand Russell.

Mr Mahmoudi has also worked in radio broadcasting and translation.

Arabic Culture in Other Languages Award

Mario Liverani, Imagining Babylon

Mr Liverani is an expert in antiquity, as professor of ancient history of the Near East at the University of Rome. He said he has devoted his entire life to ancient and Islamic history.

He hoped to explore “how the Western countries imagine the cities and towns of the Orient” to have a “more complete idea” of them, he said, adding that his book is to be published in English and Spanish.

Imagining Babylon, published last year, is a survey of the ancient city through archaeology and historical documents, and “discards a plentiful of mainstream conceptualisations of ancient Eastern history”, award organisers said.

Mr Liverani has also published work on ancient international relations and Uruk, the ancient Sumerian city.

Publishing and Technology Award

Beit Al Hikma, Tunisia

The publishing house won because of its “deep thought, responsible academic effort and the clear lively heritage of all activities of this institution”, the award organisers said.

Beit Al Hikma publishes books of literature, thought, language and dictionaries, as well as translations.