Rodaan Al Galidi (1971) is a poet and writer. Born in Iraq and trained as an architectural engineer, he has lived in the Netherlands since 1998, where he taught himself to read and write Dutch. He has written five novels and seven volumes of poetry. His work received various nominations for several prizes. The Autist and The Carrier Pigeon (2009) were awarded the prestigious European Union’s Literature Prize in 2011, the same year he failed his citizenship course.
