The International Booker Prize 2025

The judges will be looking for the best work of long-form fiction or collection of short stories translated into English and published in the UK and/or Ireland between 1 May 2024 and 30 April 2025. Publishers are now invited to submit their books here. 

The prize recognises the vital work of translators with the £50,000 prize money divided equally: £25,000 for the author and £25,000 for the translator (or divided equally between multiple translators). In addition, there is a prize of £5,000 for each of the shortlisted titles: £2,500 for the author and £2,500 for the translator (or divided equally between multiple translators).

The International Booker Prize 2025 longlist of 12 or 13 books will be announced on Tuesday, 25 February 2025, and the shortlist of six books on Tuesday, 8 April 2025. The winning title will be announced at a ceremony at London’s Tate Modern on Tuesday, 20 May 2025.

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

‘The judging panel of the International Booker Prize 2025 is made up of a novelist, a poet, a translator, a critic and a songwriter, all of whom cross boundaries into other art forms. In their various ways, they are steeped in the world of words. That deep expertise, along with their critical judgment as readers and writers, will be vitally important in the private reading and communal judging discussions that will be held over the coming months.’

(Chair) Max Porter’s first novel, Grief Is the Thing with Feathers, won the Sunday Times/Peters, Fraser + Dunlop Young Writer of the Year Award and the International Dylan Thomas Prize, among others, as well as being shortlisted for the Guardian First Book Award and the Goldsmiths Prize. Lanny was longlisted for the Booker Prize and was a Sunday Times bestseller and Shy was an instant number one bestseller. Porter has written the adapted screenplay of Shy, to be filmed by Netflix in 2024. He has also written The Death of Francis Bacon, The Hill, the short film All of this Unreal Time and the pamphlet It’s Going to Be a Bright New Day. His original drama series The Photographer is playing on BBC Radio 4 now. His work has been translated into 33 languages. 

He is a fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and is a frequent collaborator with, and mentor to, musicians, artists, theatre makers and arts and literacy charities. He was previously Editorial Director at Granta Books, where he published The Luminaries by Eleanor Catton, which won the Booker Prize 2013, and The Vegetarian by Han Kang, winner of the International Booker Prize 2016.

Sana Goyal is the Editor and Publishing Director of the British literary magazine Wasafiri, which celebrates its 40^th anniversary in 2024. She has an MA in Postcolonial Studies and a PhD in literary prizes from SOAS, University of London. She was formerly Deputy Editor at Wasafiri, Publicity Manager at Tilted Axis Press, and Marketing and Outreach Officer at Poetry Birmingham Literary Journal. Her reviews have appeared in The Guardian, Financial Times, Times Literary Supplement, Los Angeles Review of Books, The Poetry Review, Vogue India, and elsewhere. She was a judge for the 2022 Orwell Prize for Political Fiction and 2023 Republic of Consciousness Prize. 

Beth Orton is a BRIT Award-winning, multiple Mercury Prize-nominated singer-songwriter. She has released seven acclaimed solo albums over the past 27 years, showcasing her lyrical power as a songwriter across a career in which music has always been a vehicle for the exploration of words. 

In 2022 Orton released her first entirely self-produced album, Weather Alive, on Partisan Records. It was reviewed by Pitchfork as ‘the best work of her career’ and appeared on many year-end best lists, including The New York Times.

Orton has collaborated with artists such as The Chemical Brothers, Andrew Weatherall, Bert Jansch and Nick Cave. Her touring has taken her across the world, headlining performances at the Royal Albert Hall, Sydney Opera House, Glastonbury Festival, Carnegie Hall and beyond.