{"id":329977,"date":"2023-05-22T13:19:12","date_gmt":"2023-05-22T16:19:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/anba.com.br\/?p=329977"},"modified":"2023-05-24T11:58:52","modified_gmt":"2023-05-24T14:58:52","slug":"omani-novel-on-water-wins-top-arabic-fiction-prize","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/anba.com.br\/en\/omani-novel-on-water-wins-top-arabic-fiction-prize\/","title":{"rendered":"Omani novel on water wins top Arabic fiction prize"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Abu Dhabi &#8211; Omani poet and novelist Zahran Alqasmi <em>(picture above)<\/em> was named on Sunday winner of the prestigious International Prize for Arabic Fiction with his book &#8220;The Water Diviner&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>Alqasmi, 49, will receive $50,000, and the prize committee will provide funding to translate the novel into English, organisers of the annual award said on their website.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The Water Diviner&#8221; tells the story of Omani villager Salem bin Abdullah, hired by his community to find groundwater reserves.<\/p>\n<p>It touches on issues of water scarcity and extreme weather events such as floods.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;&#8216;The Water Diviner&#8217; by Zahran Alqasmi explores a new subject in modern fiction: water and its impact on the natural environment and the lives of human beings in hostile regions,&#8221; Mohammed Achaari, chairman of the judges&#8217; panel, said in a statement.<\/p>\n<p>Alqasmi, who has published four novels and 10 poetry collections, is the first Omani winner of the prize, now in its 16th year.<\/p>\n<p>He was announced this year&#8217;s winner at a ceremony in the United Arab Emirates&#8217; capital of Abu Dhabi.<\/p>\n<p>In an interview for the prize&#8217;s website, Alqasmi said the book had an additional focus: &#8220;on how women also caused changes in the life of the main protagonist.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Five other shortlisted authors, from Algeria, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Libya and Egypt, will each receive $10,000, the organisers said.<\/p>\n<p>The award is supported by oil-rich Abu Dhabi, which has taken steps to position itself as a cultural hub.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong>Any reproduction of this content is prohibited.<\/strong><\/p>\n<div class=\"credits-overlay\" data-target=\".wp-image-329979\">IPAF<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Zahran Alqasmi won the International Prize for Arabic Fiction with the book &#8220;The Water Diviner.&#8221; It tells the story of a villager who finds groundwater reserves, bringing to debate the topics of resource scarcity and extreme weather events.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2345,"featured_media":329979,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[89],"tags":[2093,7296,42050,42051,42052,42053,42054,42055,42056,42057,42058],"class_list":{"0":"post-329977","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-culture","8":"tag-book","9":"tag-international-prize-for-arabic-fiction","10":"tag-omani-novel","11":"tag-the-water-diviner","12":"tag-the-water-diviner-book","13":"tag-the-water-diviner-oman","14":"tag-the-water-diviner-omani","15":"tag-zahran-alqasmi","16":"tag-zahran-alqasmi-book","17":"tag-zahran-alqasmi-oman","18":"tag-zahran-alqasmi-omani"},"wps_subtitle":"Zahran Alqasmi won the International Prize for Arabic Fiction with the book \"The Water Diviner.\" It tells the story of a villager who finds groundwater reserves, bringing to debate the topics of resource scarcity and extreme weather events.","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/anba.com.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/329977","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/anba.com.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/anba.com.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/anba.com.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2345"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/anba.com.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=329977"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/anba.com.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/329977\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/anba.com.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/329979"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/anba.com.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=329977"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/anba.com.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=329977"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/anba.com.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=329977"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}