Ali Al Jallawi

Ali Al Jallawi (in Arabic born in 1975 in Manama, Bahrain ) is a poet, researcher, and writer. After two periods of imprisonment for writing poetry critical of the political regime in Bahrain, Al Jallawi has gone on to publish seven volumes of his work, most recently Tashta’il karazat nahd, 2008. [ citation needed ] He has written books on the Baha’i and Jewish communities in Bahrain, and presented his poetry at dozens of literary festivals both in the Arab world and elsewhere. In Manama, he ran a research center dedicated to raising awareness of Bahrain’s minority communities. However, during the Bahraini uprising, he fled the country to avoid further imprisonment. The PEN committee organized a literary fellowship in Weimar for him to save him a lengthy application for political asylum in Germany. By May 2012, he was still living in Germany, now as a fellow of the Akademie der Künste in Berlin. He is currently working on a novel titled Yadallah's Shoes.