"As part of efforts to transform Abu Dhabi into the cultural lodestone of the Middle East and expand libraries there, the emirate's Authority for Culture and Heritage has chosen the first 100 books to be translated into Arabic under a new program."Among them are Alan Greenspan's memoir, "The Age of Turbulence," John Maynard Keynes's "General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money," and Milton Friedman's "Capitalism and Freedom." The goal is to translate 100 titles every year.
"The authority, known as Adach, has formed a nonprofit organization called Kalima, which is Arabic for 'word,' to undertake the translations [...]
"The effort is part of the emirate's lavish spending on culture, which includes $27 billion for building five museums, including a Guggenheim outpost designed by Frank Gehry and a Louvre satellite designed by Jean Nouvel.
"The first 100 titles draw from history, science and fiction; Kalima is still securing the rights to most of them. More than half were originally written in English, and they include a Pulitzer Prize winner, 'The Looming Tower' by Lawrence Wright, which examines the origins of Al Qaeda, as well as the best-seller, 'The Kite Runner,' by Khaled Hosseini. Classics in the first group of books to be translated include Milton's 'Paradise Regained.' A number of works by Jewish writers are on the list, including 'Collected Stories' by the Nobel Prize recipient Isaac Bashevis Singer. [...]"
Source: Internation Herald Tribune, January 2, 2008
