Iraqi publisher seeks to promote Arab and Welsh cultures

Baghdad-born Ali Anwar has translated the Seven Voyages of Sinbad into Welsh, after 48 years of living in Wales

'I’m keen on building bridges between the two cultures,' says Cardiff-based publisher Ali Anwar. Photo: H'mm Foundation

A Cardiff-based publisher hopes his translations of Welsh poetry into Arabic will have an audience in the Middle East and build bridges between the cultures.

Ali Anwar, a retired computer engineer and business owner from Baghdad, has lived in Wales since he arrived there as a student in 1977.

He was inspired to set up his publishing company H’mm Foundation 12 years ago to promote Welsh culture in the Middle East and the Arabic language in Wales.

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One of his concerns was that young people from Arabic speaking communities in Wales were losing their native language. He also wanted to expose Welsh culture to the Arab world, where it is little known.

“I’m keen on building bridges between the two cultures. Welsh is a very old language that goes back a very long time. They are Celts, and it is the most developed of the Celtic languages,” Mr Anwar told The National.

“And I’m so proud of my own language, my culture.”

H'mm Foundation's translation into Arabic of Welsh poet Menna Elfyn’s anthology Caned Pobl Y Byd. Photo: H'mm Foundation

His first book was a translation into Arabic of Welsh poet Menna Elfyn’s anthology Caned Pobl Y Byd (Let the World's People Sing).

As no Welsh to Arabic translators were available, Mr Anwar had to first translate the book to English. He then worked with Rawan Sukkar, a Syrian translator based in the UK, and Lara Matta, assistant director of the Translation Centre at the University of Massachusetts.

He has also translated The Seven Voyages of Sinbad – the famed sailor who embarked on his voyages from Basra – into Welsh, using images from manuscripts of Arabic language classic the One Thousand and One Nights held at the Louvre in Paris.

Mr Anwar's attempt to “build bridges” comes as the UK sees a rise in anti-immigrant and anti-Muslim sentiment, and new government policies aimed at stopping irregular migration and restricting access to visas.

“The sad thing is they're mixing everything together: illegal migration with the culture and people legally living here and working hard. The [migration] policies are not clear policies,” he said.

Mr Anwar, now 68, recently wound down the IT company that he founded in 1989, CADCentre, which had over a dozen branches in cities across the country. He hopes to dedicate his time to publishing, using new technologies and AI to promote the books.

Arabic is one of the world’s most widely spoken languages, but its once prolific publishing industry is in decline, and illiteracy rates are on the rise.

Among diaspora communities, the children and grandchildren of Arabic-speaking immigrants are rapidly losing the language – which alarms Mr Anwar most. “The first generation keep their language, but by the second or third generation it disappears,” he said.

The name H'mm Foundation came from his observation that poets often hum before their speak. Mr Anwar said the late Welsh poet RS Thomas “used to hum all the time”.

He speaks fondly of the Arabic-speaking community in Cardiff, which has historic roots in the port and origins in Yemen and Somalia.

Mr Anwar hopes to donate some of the books to the National Library in Baghdad, so that fellow Iraqis will know about Wales, which he describes as the place where he has “been hiding in” for almost half a century.