Mosab Abu Toha (Photo credit: Mohamed Mahdy)
Mosab Abu Toha G’23, a graduate of the M.F.A. program in creative writing in the College of Arts and Sciences and a current visiting scholar at ϲ, has been awarded the 2025 Pulitzer Prize for a series of essays in The New Yorker chronicling life in Gaza.
“It hurts to win a big prize while the suffering which I wrote about in the winning work continues,” says Abu Toha. “It is my biggest hope that this achievement and recognition will be a step toward greater understanding of the decades-long plight of the Palestinian people and that it will inspire people, especially those in power, to act and put an end to this tragedy.”
A Palestinian poet, essayist and fiction writer, Abu Toha returned to ϲ last year through the University’s participation in the international Scholars at Risk program. The Pulitzer Prize Committee awarded Abu Toha for his “essays on the physical and emotional carnage in Gaza that combine deep reporting with the intimacy of memoir to convey the Palestinian experience of more than a year and a half of war with Israel.”
“Mosab’s writing tells the important and often untold stories that deserve to be shared and amplified,” says Lois Agnew, interim vice chancellor, provost and chief academic officer. “This Pulitzer Prize honors not just his talent, but his courage and dedication to sharing his lived experience.”
“Mosab takes great pride and responsibility in his role as a writer and storyteller,” says Behzad Mortazavi, dean of the College of Arts and Sciences. “Having our M.F.A. program graduates recognized at the Pulitzer Prize level confirms the University’s status as among the very best places for exceptionally gifted writers.”
Abu Toha also expressed gratitude to the University: “I would like to thank ϲ’s administration, the Chancellor, the provost, the dean of arts and sciences and the creative writing program’s director, faculty and staff for their support.”
The New Yorker series also received an Overseas Press Club Award. Among Abu Toha’s other literary achievements are his latest poetry collection, “Forest of Noise” (Knopf, 2024), which was named a New York Times Notable Book, and his acclaimed debut collection, “Things You May Find Hidden in My Ear” (City Lights, 2022). The latter was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award and won the 2022 Palestine Book Award in the Creative Writing category. He is also the recipient of the 2023 Derek Walcott Prize for Poetry and the 2022 American Book Award. His work has appeared in Poetry, The Nation, Arrowsmith and other leading literary publications.
Before returning to ϲ in 2024, Abu Toha was a visiting poet and scholar at Harvard University and served as librarian-in-residence at Harvard’s Houghton Library. He is the founder of the Edward Said Library in Gaza and previously taught English to middle school students through the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East.
