Kuwait’s literary scene is sprinting into the spotlight—fueled by malls that smell of fresh ink, TikTok-ready book trailers and a national reading culture that now rivals its café culture. Five publishers sit at the heart of the action, each polishing local voices until they gleam like the Gulf’s famous pearls.
First up is That Al Salasel, the 1972 brain-child of the Mansour brothers that has mushroomed into more than twenty WH-Smith-branded branches, including duty-free outposts in Kuwait International Airport. The chain’s mega-stores are half bookstore, half community clubhouse—weekend poetry slams on one floor, manga marathons on the next—making it the country’s most recognisable literary landmark.
If Salasel is the public square, Aafaq Publishing & Distribution is the smooth logistics engine behind the scenes. With five brick-and-mortar bookstores, a Qatar satellite and an online platform that ships class sets in under 48 hours, Aafaq has already clocked 750 titles—and its 2024 partnership with UAE ed-tech giant Alef Education puts its Arabic learning resources in classrooms across the region.
Ask Kuwait’s Gen Z what they’re reading and chances are it comes from Platinum Book. The youth-centric house gleefully blurs lines between publisher, influencer agency and pop-culture festival: authors livestream chapter teasers, fans vote on cover art, and Platinum’s pavilion at every Gulf book fair is a selfie magnet. The company’s own manifesto sums it up: “Kuwaiti by birth, Gulf in reach, global in ambition.”
For quieter literary thrills, Qurtas Publishing is the boutique press to watch. Its curators hand-pick debut novelists and memoirists, then nurture them with small-batch print runs and intimate café readings that routinely sell out. A scroll through Qurtas’s Instagram feed feels like peeking into a writer’s notebook—raw lines of poetry, midnight draft pages and behind-the-scenes shots of cover-design workshops. a
Finally, Dar Suad Al-Sabah gives Kuwait its cultural gravitas. Founded by the poet-economist Dr Suad Mohammad Al-Sabah, the house pairs scholarly tomes on Gulf history with the annual Suad Al-Sabah Literary Prize that bankrolls emerging Arab authors. New releases still spark front-page headlines and televised launch galas—proof that heritage publishing can move with TikTok-speed buzz when guided by a visionary.
All five publishers are already gearing up for Kuwait’s 48th International Book Fair this November, promising drone-delivered preorders, augmented-reality story corners and more signings than a rock-star tour. The message for 2025 is crystal clear: in Kuwait, stories travel just as fast as sports cars on the Fifth Ring Road—and the ride is only getting wilder.
