Alaa Al Aswany

Alaa Al Aswany (Arabic: علاء الأسواني, IPA: [ʕæˈlæːʔ elɑsˈwɑːni]; born 26 May 1957) is an Egyptian writer, novelist, dentist and a founding member of the political movement Kefaya.

[3] His father, Abbas Al Aswany, was from Aswan[4] (in Lower Nubia) and was a lawyer and writer who "is remembered as being a captivating and charismatic speaker with a broad following and loyalty within a cross-section of the Egyptian revolutionary intelligentsia".

Abbas Al Aswany wrote a regular back-page essay in the Egyptian weekly magazine Rose al-Yūsuf entitled Aswaaniyat.

[11] They include Armenian, Bosnian, Bulgarian, Castilian, Chinese, Croatian, Danish, Dutch, English, Estonian, Finnish, French, Galician, German, Greek, Hebrew, Icelandic, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Malaysian, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese, Romanian, Russian, Serbian, Slovak, Slovenian, Spanish, Swedish, and Turkish.

Al Aswany's name has also been included in the list of the 500 Most Influential Muslims in the World,[14] issued by the Royal Islamic Strategic Studies Center in Amman, Jordan.

[15] Al Aswany participated in the Blue Metropolis literary festival in Montreal, June 2008 and April 2010, and was featured in interviews with the CBC programme Writers and Company.

In January 2015, the Gingko Library published Democracy is the Answer: Egypt's Years of Revolution, a collection of newspaper columns written by Al Aswany for Al-Masry Al-Youm between 2011 and 2014.

[21] Shafik lost his temper under persistent grilling by the novelist and it was the first time for Egyptians to witness a ruler dressed down so severely by a civilian in public.

[13] Al Aswany supported 2013 Coup d'état against the Muslim brotherhood led government, stating that they were neither democratic, he said: "They are a group of terrorists and fascists.

[25] In 2022, after exile and in the wake of publishing his new novel, he stated in CBC radio interview "I'm quite sure the revolution will win and I believe the change has already happened," said Al Aswany, "the future is on our side.