Image © © Khasraw Hamakarim
Location: Cologne, Germany
Bachtyar Ali
Bachtyar Ali was born in the city of Sulaimaniyah in Iraqi Kurdistan. He has been living in Germany for over two decades. A prominent Kurdish intellectual, Ali has written 40 books, including 12 novels, as well as a number of essay books and collections of poetry. His novels have become instant bestsellers in both Iraq and Iran. The Last Pomegranate Tree also sold over 25,000 in German. In 2024, it featured on the list of the 100 best books of the 21st century in the respectable German-language Swiss newspaper NZZ. His novels have been translated into Persian, Arabic, Turkish, German, Italian, French and English, a renown very few authors writing in the Kurdish language enjoy. In 2017, he was awarded the Nelly Sachs Prize in Germany, joining past recipients such as Milan Kundera, Margaret Atwood and Javier Marias. He is the first author writing in a non-European language to do so. In March 2024 he was honoured with the prestigious German award Hilde Domin Prize for literature in exile.
