“Reaching Horizons” hosts the winners of the Ibn Battuta Award branches

Saad Abdul Radi (Abu Dhabi)

The Center for Exploring Horizons – the Arab Center for Geographical Literature organized a celebration in the presence of the winners of the “Ibn Battuta Award” and the Arab Award for Travel Literature in its 22nd session for the year 2024, entitled “A Celebration of a Bridge between the East and the Maghreb and between the Arabs and the World.” This took place on Friday afternoon at the Memphis platform at the Abu Dhabi International Book Fair.
At the beginning of the celebration, poet Nouri Al-Jarrah, director of the Horizons Outreach Centre, spoke. He said: “The center was established in 2000, and at that time we presented investigations of several journeys, including the journey of Ibn Battuta and the journey of Ibn Jubayr, and after that many works, such as Ibn Fadlan, who had achieved for the first time in the seventies. The Center also launched the Ibn Battuta Award after that.” He explained: “It was necessary to incite contemporary, present and open awareness of the needs of Arab culture, and it was necessary to brainstorm to imagine Arab culture after investigations that took place at the hands of a number of French, Russian and German orientalists.”
Al-Jarrah said: “Next year, we will celebrate the silver jubilee of our project, and we will dedicate it to Hajj trips. Because it constitutes communication between the East and the West, we also opened a branch for the Novel Award that is inspired by the journey.”
In turn, Dr. Al-Taie, one of the winners of the Ibn Battuta Award and a permanent member of the award, said: “The Horizons Exploration Center was able to touch upon a group of theories and methodological approaches, and there is a group of approaches that can be worked on in the coming period, including the poetic approach, the semiotic approach, and others.” .
Winners speak
The celebration continued with a lecture in which the winners of this year’s Ibn Battuta Award branches participated and spoke about their work. They are: The winners of the Syrian True Journey branch, Ahmed Ibrahim Al-Naasan, about the investigation of the book (Entertaining the Stranger in Every Strange Thing – A Journey to Brazil) by Abdul Rahman bin Abdullah Al-Baghdadi Al-Dimashqi Al-Madani. Al-Hasani, Ahmed Juma Abdel Hamid, and Yahya Zakaria Al-Souda from Egypt, about the investigation of the book (The Ambassador of the Returned and the Pioneer of Happiness) by Ali bin Yahya bin Ahmed Al-Kilani Al-Qadiri Al-Hamawi.
As for the “Contemporary Journey” section, the Libyan Abu Al-Harith Musa Ibrahim won for the book (Tours in the World), and the Moroccan Muhammad Khalil won for the book (This Is How I Knew China). The Diary Branch Award went to Tunisian Hassouna Al-Mesbahi for the book (Days in Istanbul). In the “Studies Branch,” Moroccan Noureddine Balkoudry won for “Imagination in the Contemporary Arab Journey,” Mohamed Reda Boudchar for “The Late Andalusians in European Journeys to Spain,” and Qatari woman Athba al-Maslamani for “Narrative Discourse in the Journeys of al-Ghassani and al-Wardani.”
In the “Translated Journey” branch, the Saudi Ibrahim bin Muhammad Al-Batshan won for translating the book (Morocco… People and Countries), the Libyan Ihsin Hamad Ihsin Mahmoud won for translating the book (In Search of the Masked Tuareg), and the Syrian Imad Al-Ahmad won for translating the book (Bloodstone).