Egyptian scholar Ziedan grateful for KFAS prize

KUWAIT: Youssef Ziedan, a renowned Egyptian scholar who specializes in Arabic and Islamic studies, said Sunday evening his honoring by Kuwait will give a great impetus to his literary march particularly in the short story writing.

Ziedan, director of the Manuscript Center and Museum of Bibliotheca Alexandrina, has won the award of Kuwait Foundation for the Advancement of Sciences (KFAS) for his book ‘Al-Shamil filSina’a Al-Tibbiyya’ (the comprehensive in the medical industry).

“Through my interest in fiction writing is primarily focused on novel, I felt duty bound to write short stories which require exceptional writing and linguistic talents,” he said at a seminar titled “brainstorming on the writer Youssef Ziedan.”

The seminar was held on the fringe of the 40th Kuwait international book fair which continues until November 28. On Al-Shamil, Ziedan said the book falls in 30 volumes and took 12 years of laboring to complete, noting that he used to devote 15 hours daily to writing.

Born in Sohaj, Upper Egypt, in 1958, he moved with his grandfather to Alexandria when he was still a child. He got his PhD degree from the philosophy department, the University of Alexandria, in 1989. Recalling his childhood memories, Ziedan said this Mediterranean city had great impact on his fiction and historical writings that total in number 50 books.

“This impact was clearer in my second novel ‘Azazeel,’ a historical theological work which won the 2009 International Prize for Arabic Fiction,” he pointed out. The first work is ‘Zil Al-Af’a’ (Shadow of Serpent). He called on the educational and cultural institutions in the Arab countries to do more efforts to maintain the cultural identity of the young generation and bring the Arab peoples closer to each other.

Ziedan worked as a consultant in the field of Arabic heritage preservation and conservation in a number of international institutions, including UNESCO, ESCWA and the Arab League, and has directed a number of projects aimed at the delimitation and preservation of Arabic manuscript heritage.