Hartmut Fähndrich

Who is Hartmut Fähndrich?

Hartmut Fähndrich is a German scholar and translator, specialising in translation of Arabic literature into German. He was born in Tübingen and studied at the universities of Tübingen, Münster, and UCLA. He obtained an MA in comparative literature and a PhD in Islamic studies from UCLA. In 1972, he moved to Switzerland where he has lived ever since. He has taught at the University of Berne and the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zürich.

Fähndrich has translated more than 50 book-length works and numerous other shorter pieces. His first translated work was Wild Thorns by Sahar Khalifeh in 1983. Since then he has translated books by many of the most important Arabic writers, from Naguib Mahfouz to Alaa al-Aswany. A partial list of these writers is provided below; the full list can be found here.

Fähndrich has received numerous awards for his work, including several from the city of Berne, one from the Arab League in 2004, from Egypt's Supreme Council of Culture in 2006, and the Saudi King Abdullah International Award for Translation in 2009, the world's richest translation prize. Of the Saudi award, Fähndrich said that only a fraction of the prize money he was supposed to have shared with an Arab colleague has arrived so far, Fähndrich said "I feel I've been cheated". Fähndrich was also a member of the IPAF jury in 2008.