The longlist of 16 titles has been selected for the 2026 International Prize for Arabic Fiction, sponsored by the Abu Dhabi Arabic Language Centre, at the Department of Culture and Tourism, Abu Dhabi. The six shortlisted titles will be announced in February 2026, and the winning novel on April 9. The winner receives $50,000, and each shortlisted finalist receives $10,000. To see the 16 longlisted titles, click here.
Chair of judges Mohamed Elkadhi said: "The novels included in this year's longlist are a microcosm of the contemporary Arab literary scene in all its richness and variety. Many of the novels turn inward, exploring the private worlds of distinctive and unforgettable characters experiencing psychological crises and struggling to adapt to lived reality. History, too, figures prominently in works that evoke the recent or distant past with striking immediacy, probing its reverberations in the present.
"Questions of identity also recur, framed against the backdrop of war, conflict, migration, revolution, and the uneven rhythms of social and urban change. While some writers adopt realism and classical structures, a greater number blur the boundaries between the real and the extraordinary.
"Their narratives employ multiple narrators, streams of consciousness, and fragmented structures to reflect the relativity of the universe. Digging deep into the human psyche, they portray the pain suffered by those who feel isolated and alienated from reality, as they strive to uncover a truth distinct to that commonly accepted, moving in the orbits of the repressed and the unspoken."