Last autumn, the Booker Prize Foundation and English PEN unveiled a new scheme to support translators from the Global Majority – PEN Presents x International Booker Prize. Now, the two organisations have announced the winners of the inaugural edition of the programme.     

For years, submissions to the International Booker Prize and English PEN’s PEN Translates programme have told the same story: while the representation of authors of the Global Majority is increasing, translators from the Global Majority remain significantly underrepresented. PEN Presents x International Booker Prize was launched in late 2024 to address this disparity by funding and promoting the work of Global Majority translators so that more literature in translation, created by a wider range of talented individuals, reaches English-language readers.      

As part of the new scheme, translators from the Global Majority, based anywhere in the world, were invited to submit proposals to create sample translations of previously untranslated works of long-form fiction or collections of short stories by any author, from any language and region, and of any style, genre and era. 

The winning projects showcase six works of fiction representing five languages and five regions. This is the first time the English PEN translation grants programme has supported work originally published in Malay, Filipino, and Cebuano, and the first time it has supported work from the Philippines.  

The winning translators are:

John Bengan for a translation, from Cebuano, of The Man With a Thousand Names: Stories by R. Joseph Dazo (Philippines). Bengan has taught writing, literature, and translation at the Department of Humanities in the University of the Philippines Mindanao, and his translations have appeared in Words Without Borders, LIT, ANMLY, World Literature Today, Shenandoah, and The Margins, among others. He is currently reading a PhD in Artistic, Literary and Cultural Studies at the Universidad Autónoma de Madrid.

Christian Jil R. Benitez for a translation, from Filipino, of Time of the Eye by Alvin B. Yapan (Philippines). Benitez is a Filipino scholar, poet, and translator. His critical and creative writings have been published in various journals and anthologies, including eTropic, Kritika Kultura, and Here was Once the Sea. Most recently, his translation of Arasahas: Poems from the Tropics was published by PAWA Press and Paloma Press. He is currently finishing his PhD in comparative literature at Chulalongkorn University in Thailand.

Pauline Fan for a translation, from Malay, of The Last Days of Jesselton by Ruhaini Matdarin (Malaysia). Fan is a writer, literary translator, and cultural researcher from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Her translation of An Ordinary Tale about Women and Other Stories by Malay writer Fatimah Busu was published by Penguin Random House SEA in 2024. Her translation of poems by Sarawak poet Kulleh Grasi, Tell Me, Kenyalang (Circumference Books, 2019), was shortlisted in the United States for the National Translation Award in Poetry, and longlisted for the Best Translated Book Awards in 2020. She currently serves as adjunct professor at the Faculty of Modern Languages and Communication at Universiti Putra Malaysia.

Mayada Ibrahim and Najlaa Eltom for a translation, from Arabic, of Ireem by Stella Gaitano (Sudan). Ibrahim is a literary translator, editor, and writer based in New York, USA, with roots in Khartoum and London. She works between Arabic and English, and her translations have been published by Willows House in South Sudan, Foundry Editions, Dolce Stil Criollo, and 128 Lit. She is the managing editor at Tilted Axis Press, a publisher of contemporary literature by the Global Majority, and is an adjunct lecturer of Arabic at Hunter College (CUNY) as well as a founding member of the Translators Organizing Committee within the National Writers Union. Eltom is a Sudanese poet, writer, and translator whose work explores language, movement and the shifting landscapes of memory. She published three poetry collections: Melodies of Speed, The Immortal Felony with Earrings and The Doctrine of Thinness, in addition to a number of short stories and essays.

Tiffany Tsao for a translation, from Indonesian, of The Born Out of Wedlock Club by Grace Tioso (Indonesia). Tsao is a novelist and literary translator whose translations of Indonesian fiction have been awarded the PEN Translates Award, the NSW Premier’s Translation Prize, the Republic of Consciousness Prize, and have been longlisted for the International Booker Prize. Her third novel, The Majesties, was longlisted for the 2019 Ned Kelly Award. Her next novel, But Won’t I Miss Me?, will be published by HarperVia in 2026.

Anam Zafar for a translation, from Arabic, of Playing With Soldiers by Tariq Asrawi (Palestine). Zafar is a multi-award-winning translator from Arabic and French to English. Her co-translation of Josephine Baker’s memoir Fearless and Free, with Sophie Lewis, is out now with Vintage Classics/Tiny Reparations. Her co-translation with Nadiyah Abdullatif of Yoghurt and Jam, Or How My Mother Became Lebanese, Lena Merhej’s graphic memoir, won a PEN Translates award, was shortlisted for the Saif Ghobash Prize and was longlisted for the Warwick Prize for Women in Translation. She appears on the 100 Inspiring Muslims: Next Generation Edition list (Emerald Network/Aziz Foundation). She has also won the Gulf Coast Prize in Translation and the Stinging Fly New Translator’s Bursary. 

The winners were chosen from a shortlist of 12 samples, by a cross-sector panel of seven experts, chaired by Preti Taneja, writer, Professor of World Literature and Creative Writing at Newcastle University, and English PEN Translation Advisory Co-chair. She was joined by Safae El-Ouahabi, Associate at the RCW Literary Agency; Elisabeth Jaquette, translator from   Arabic and Executive Director of Words Without Borders; Željka Marošević, Editorial Director at Jonathan Cape; Nii Ayikwei Parkes, writer, editor and Director at flipped eye publishing; Fiammetta Rocco, Administrator of the International Booker Prize; and Shash Trevett, poet and translator from Tamil.  

The shortlisted translators were awarded £500 grants to create 5,000-word samples of their proposed works. Independent assessors, drawn from English PEN’s pool of established literary translators, were commissioned to evaluate the samples and original works, before the selection panel then selected six projects as PEN Presents x International Booker Prize winners.  

The winning translators have received editorial support from English PEN and worked with experienced editors over the last month, and their samples are now available to read on the English PEN website. These projects will be promoted to publishers and commissioning editors in the UK and the wider Anglophone publishing landscape. Half of all PEN Presents-winning projects have since been acquired by publishers.  

Preti Taneja, Chair of the selection panel and English PEN Translation Advisory Co-chair, said:  

‘These samples showcase the very best of what the PEN Presents x International Booker Prize round aims to support. Bringing a range of expertise and with unanimous feeling, the panel and I are very proud to support these translators as their samples make their way into the Anglophone world.’  

Fiammetta Rocco, Administrator of the International Booker Prize, added: 

‘PEN Presents x the International Booker Prize was born out of a joint desire to platform, fund and support the best fiction translators from the Global Majority, who are currently chronically underrepresented in the UK publishing landscape.  

‘The translator of this year’s International Booker Prize winner, Heart Lamp, Deepa Bhasthi, was both the first working from Kannada - a major language spoken by an estimated 65 million people –and the first translator from the Global Majority to win the prize. The short story collection, written by Indian activist and lawyer Banu Mushtaq, found its UK publisher after a translation sample was selected in an earlier round of PEN Presents, which highlights just how vital the programme is.  

‘It’s exciting that so many of this inaugural cohort of talented winners – which include translators working from five languages and five regions – might bring a new readership to these works, with five of the authors of the showcase samples never having books translated into English and published in the UK before. We look forward to seeing what they do next.’  

Will Forrester, Head of Literature Programmes, English PEN, said:  
 
‘These six samples are stunningly different in voice and style and theme, and stunningly alike in their brilliance. They speak to why English PEN and the Booker Prize Foundation have partnered on this project: through concerted work in recognition of translators from the Global Majority, these exceptional titles, authors and translators have emerged. They represent several linguistic and regional “firsts” for both organisations.  

‘From what the selection panel call the “humour, warmth, and unflinching honesty” of The Man with a Thousand Names to the “lyrical and empathetic” The Last Days of Jesselton; from the “playfully witty and thoughtful exploration of diasporic identity” in The Born Out of Wedlock Club to the “vibrant and important multi-generational epic set against conflict and tension” of Ireme; from Playing with Soldiers’ wrenchingly beautiful depiction of childhood fun and childhood pain in Palestine to a hauntingly lyrical depiction of sixty years of personal and historical saga in the Philippines in Time of the Eye, we know these projects will beguile editors and, thereafter, English-language readers across the world.’

PEN Presents supports and showcases sample translations, funding the often-unpaid work of creating samples, giving UK publishers access to titles from underrepresented languages and regions, and helping diversify the translated literature landscape. 

English PEN is one of the world’s oldest human rights organisations, championing the freedom to write and read. It is the founding centre of PEN International, a worldwide writers’ association with 130 centres in more than 90 countries.