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Indian author Banu Mushtaq and translator Deepa Bhasthi have won the International Booker Prize for fiction for “Heart Lamp,” a collection of 12 short stories written over a period of more than 30 years and which chronicle the everyday lives and struggles of women in southern India.
Mushtaq’s win is historic in several ways, as it is the first time that the award has been given to a collection of short stories. “Heart Lamp” is also the first book written in the Kannada language, which is spoken in the southern Indian state of Karnataka, to win the prestigious prize.
Mushtaq becomes the sixth female author to be awarded the International Booker Prize since it took on its current form in 2016, and Bhasthi is the first Indian translator – and ninth female translator – to win the prize.
Bhasthi said that she hoped that the win would encourage more translations from and into Kannada and other South Asian languages.
In her acceptance speech, Mushtaq thanked readers for letting her words wander into their hearts.
“This book was born from the belief that no story is ever small; that in the tapestry of human experience, every thread holds the weight of the whole,” she said. “In a world that often tries to divide us, literature remains one of the last sacred spaces where we can live inside each other’s minds, if only for a few pages.”
The award was announced by bestselling Booker Prize-longlisted author Max Porter in his role as chair of the five-member voting panel, at a ceremony at London’s Tate Modern.
Porter praised the “radical” nature of the translation, adding that “it’s been a joy” to listen to the evolving appreciation of the stories by members of the jury.
“These beautiful, busy, life-affirming stories rise from Kannada, interspersed with the extraordinary socio-political richness of other languages and dialects,” said Porter. ”It speaks of women’s lives, reproductive rights, faith, caste, power and oppression.”
The book, which beat five other finalists, comprises stories written from 1990 to 2023. They were selected and curated by Bhasthi, who was keen to preserve the multilingual nature of southern India in her translation.
Mushtaq, who is a lawyer and activist as well as writer, told a short list reading event on Sunday that the stories “are about women – how religion, society and politics demand unquestioning obedience from them, and in doing so, inflict inhumane cruelty upon them, turning them into mere subordinates.”
The £50,000 (€44,000) prize money is to be divided equally between author and translator.
The International Booker Prize runs alongside the Booker Prize for English-language fiction, which will be handed out in the fall.
Additional sources • AP