His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai, congratulated Professor Charbel Dagher on winning the Great Arab Minds 2025 Award in the Literature and Arts category. His Highness highlighted the central role that literature and the arts have played in shaping societies and civilisations throughout history.
In a post on X, His Highness said: "We congratulate the winner of the Great Arab Minds 2025 Award in Literature and Arts, Professor Charbel Dagher from Lebanon, Professor of Arabic Literature. Over several decades, he has made significant intellectual contributions across multiple literary fields, including poetry, writing, and literary criticism. He has also conducted in-depth studies of Arab arts, examining their historical development and the transformations they have undergone."
His Highness added: " Professor Charbel has published more than 70 books, through which he has enriched the fields of literature and the arts in the Arab world. His publications are considered key references for the study of Arab literature and art throughout history.”
His Highness further said: “We congratulate all the winners of the Great Arab Minds Award, and we say to all Arabs that those who built the greatest civilisation in history are capable today of building an even greater future, if they believe in themselves, in their potential, and in their role in renewing civilisation."
The Great Arab Minds Award is the largest initiative of its kind in the Arab world. Since its launch by His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, it has established itself as the Arab equivalent of the Noble Prize, recognising exceptional Arab minds and their contributions across six main categories: Literature and Arts, Architecture and Design, Engineering and Technology, Medicine, Economics, and Natural Sciences.
Among Professor Dagher’s most widely recognised works, considered key references in the study of Islamic and Arab art, Arabic calligraphy, and modern visual arts, are Islamic Art in Arabic Sources: The Craft of Ornamentation and Beauty; Arabic Hurufiyya: Art and Identity; Art and the East; and The Eye and the Painting.
Professor Dagher is regarded as one of the leading cultural figures in Lebanon and the Arab world. A poet, critic, and academic, he combines creative practice with rigorous research. Born in 1950, he developed his intellectual path within a rich cultural environment and has built, over more than five decades, a substantial body of literary and critical work that has contributed to the advancement of aesthetic studies and Arab art criticism.
Writing in both Arabic and French, Professor Dagher has engaged with diverse intellectual traditions, developing approaches that connect heritage and modernity. His work is characterised by the integration of poetry, aesthetic studies, and art criticism, with significant contributions to the study of Islamic and modern Arab art and to discussions on cultural identity in contemporary art criticism.
Professor Dagher is Professor of Arabic Literature and Arts at the University of Balamand and has an active academic and research presence across universities and cultural institutions. He has authored numerous books in poetry, criticism, and arts, many of which are widely recognised as references works in the Arab literary and artistic field.
His Excellency Mohammed bin Abdullah Al Gergawi, Minister of Cabinet Affairs and Chair of the Higher Committee for the Great Arab Minds initiative, informed Professor Dagher of his win during a video call. His Excellency highlighted the shared human values reflected in Professor Dagher’s work, which has achieved international recognition and reached audiences across cultures through the universal language of literature and art.
DUBAI (ALETIHAD)