Dubai: Famous Lebanese journalist and novelist, Amin Maalouf, was announced the winner of the prestigious Sultan Bin Ali Al Owais Award for the Cultural and Scientific Achievement Category.
Abdul Hamid Ahmad, Secretary General of the award, said the winner was selected out of 162 nominees by the board of trustees of the foundation as per the rule of the category.
The value of the prize is $120,000 (Dh438,000). The award has other four categories with equal prize money of which the winners were selected by a panel of judges two weeks ago.
"Amin Maalouf represents a writer and a novelist with rich memory which he utilised throughout the four decades of his works to shed some lights on important moments in the life of people in the east and introduce them to the world. He specialised in events concerning Arabs and Muslims. His novel works were unique for the amount of research and hard work being invested by the writer. His simple and easy way of writing and the unfolding of events in addition to the genuine selection of topics have all played great role in representing personality and events that took place in the Arab and Islamic region. The works of Maalouf have great influence on shaping the opinion and explaining events in the west. His books represent a bridge between the east and west civilisations," Ahmad said.
He said Maalouf is directing his works to the ordinary readers which was the reason behind the popular writing among readers throughout the world and in different languages.
Ahmad said works like The Crusades Through Arab Eyes, Leo Africanus, Samarkand, The Rock of Tanios, The Gardens of Light.
He said the foundation wishes Maalouf all the success in his endavour to serve Arab culture.
Maalfouf born in Lebanon in 25, February, 1947. His native language was Arabic but most of the writer books were published in French. Maalouf's books have a historical setting the mixes the history with fantasy and philosophical ideas. According to critiques of his works, Maalouf is master storyteller, offer a sensitive view of the values and attitudes of different cultures in the Middle East, Africa and Mediterranean world.
The prize will be handed over to Maalfouf and the other four winners in Dubai at a special ceremony.
Dr Mohammad Ali Sahmsul Din, Lebanon, won the Poetry award. Radwa Ashour, Egypt won the story and playwrite award and Dr Faisal Darraj, Plaestine, won the literature and critique studies award of the 5-category award. The late Dr Abdul Aziz Al Douri, Iraq, won the human and future studies prize.
Quotes from Amin Maalouf's work
"I am the son of the road , my country is a caravan and my life is the most unexpected of voyages. i belong to earth and to the god and it is to them that I will one day soon return"
"What makes me myself rather than anyone else is the very fact that I am poised between two countries, two or three languages, and several cultural traditions. It is precisely this that defines my identity. Would I exist more authentically if I cut off a part of myself" -Amin Maalouf, In the Name of Identity: Violence and the Need to Belong
"We are not just visitors on this planet, it belongs to us just as we belong to her, its past is ours, so is its future." - Amin Maalouf, Le Premier Siecle Apres Beatrice
"Every individual is a meeting ground for many different allegiances, and sometimes these loyalties conflict with one another and confront the person who harbors them with difficult choices" - Amin Maalouf, In the Name of Identity: Violence and the Need to Belong
"Let us thank God for having made us this gift of death, so that life is to have meaning; of night, that day is to have meaning; silence, that speech is to have meaning; illness, that health is to have meaning; war, that peace is to have meaning. Let us give thanks to Him for having given us weariness and pain, so that rest and joy are to have meaning. Let us give thanks to him, whose wisdom is infinite." -Amin Maalouf, Leo Africanus
