Dr. Hatem Al Zahrani is a poet, literary critic and academic specializing in Arabic and Islamic studies and literature. He works as a consultant in international cultural relations. He holds an MA in Oriental Studies from Yale University (2014) and a PhD in Arabic and Islamic Studies from Georgetown University (2019). His research interests are not limited to his specialization or by a specific historical or geographical framework, they generally span to cover issues of identity, influence, sustainability and power in poetry and literature. He is also interested in exploring and studying new transformations in literature and the cultural sphere in the Arabian Peninsula.

 

He has published books and critical articles in Arabic and English, in addition to his work of translating Arabic poetry into English. In 2023, he published a lengthy study – which included original translations – on Reimagining Identity in Modernist Poetry in Saudi Arabia, a chapter in a Routledge book on Arabic Poetry. He has published two poetry collections: Alya’ Ya'i in 2009 and I Honor Al-Muthanna at Yale in 2019. He has won several national and international awards and has been a guest at numerous poetry readings and festivals at international cultural and academic centers.

 

Al Zahrani’s poetry has been translated into several languages, and some of these translations have been published in international literary journals and anthologies. He has also published a number of studies on his poetic and cultural experience in general, both in the Arab world and internationally. He published a translation of selections from the recent collections of Bahraini poet Qassim Haddad, in collaboration with Dr. Roger Allen and Dr. Huda Fakhreddine of the University of Pennsylvania.

 

Al Zahrani has participated in local and international conferences and seminars, and has published on Arab culture in general to provide a clearer image of the cultural transformations in Saudi and the Gulf to Western cultural circles. He is also involved in several cultural projects aimed at reintroducing Arab culture to the contemporary world. In addition to reviewing and editing Arabic and English texts at the Mu’allaqat for the Millennial Generation project (published by Ithra Center in 2020), a bilingual volume containing the ten Mu’allaqat with introductions and commentaries in Arabic and translations into English, he also worked as a Content and International Communication Supervisor.