Alaa Al-Aswany is the recipient of many distinguished international literary honours and awards. His novels are acclaimed in the field of contemporary literature, selling millions of copies in three dozen languages and adapted into film and theatre performances. Al-Aswany reached international literary acclaim with his ground-breaking 2002 novel The Yacoubian Building. Through the prism of a fashionable downtown Cairo building, he exposes the corrupt dealmaking and exploitative relationships of power in Mubarak’s Egypt. His latest novel The Republic, As If, published in 2018, is set during the events of Egypt’s 2011 revolution. Al-Aswany is the author of 17 books—novels, short story collections, and compendiums of his articles. He has taught and lectured at universities and leading cultural institutions around the world. A leading democracy advocate, his op-eds have appeared in influential publications and he also pens a weekly column for Deutsche Welle’s Arabic news site.