The 51st Anniversary of the National Literature Awards, held at the National Rabat Library on October 18, 2019, has awarded ten Moroccan authors with literary awards. The winning books were chosen from a list of 191 texts and selected by a Moroccan jury comprised of an academic background from a variety of fields.
Among the many notable guests in attendance from the fields of politics, culture, and academia was Andre Azoulay, the senior advisor to King Mohammed VI and Abdelhak Lamrini a Moroccan historian. In addition to hosting the award ceremony, Rabat’s National Library has been in the news a lot this 2019. In April, due to a new partnership between the BMCE Bank Foundation and the Rabat library, a solar plant was inaugurated. The development will energize up to 40 percent of the Rabat library with it’s 600 solar panels, solar inverters, and a remote monitoring system.
The ten winners were distinguished in the following categories:
Poetry
Mustapha Melh won for “I Blame Nobody” (in Arabic) and Rachid Khaless for his book “Total War” (in French).
Narrative Story
Abderrahim Jiran’s “The Stone and the Blessing” (in Arabic) won the narrative story.
Moulaid El Adnani earned the Amazigh literature award for her book “The Recall of Nights” (in Amazigh).
Social sciences
Ayad Ablal was highlighted for his book “Complex Ignorance, Religion, Religiosity, and Religious Issues in the Arab World” (in Arabic).
Khalid Zakri earned an award for his work “Arab Modernities, From Modernity to Globalization” (in French).
Literature
Ibrahim Al Hussein’s book “Caricature in Morocco, Irony and the Issue of the Forbidden” (in Arabic) won the literature award.
Cultural Studies
Ahmed El Mounadi’s “Amazigh Modern Poetry” (in Arabic) won the cultural studies award.
Best Translation
Hassan Taleb’s translation from French to Arabic of “The Near and the Far, a Century of Anthropology in Morocco” was presented with the translation awards.