Banu Mushtaq’s Kannada short story collection on International Booker Prize longlist
London, Feb 25 (PTI): Karnataka-based writer, activist and lawyer Banu Mushtaq’s short story collection ‘Heart Lamp’, translated from Kannada to English by Deepa Bhasthi, was on Tuesday longlisted for the International Booker Prize 2025 in London.
Chosen among 13 worldwide titles, Mushtaq’s work appealed to the judges for its “witty, vivid, colloquial, moving and excoriating” style of capturing portraits of family and community tensions. It marks the first time a Kannada title has made it to the longlist of the GBP 50,000 literary prize – divided between author and translator.
“Exploring the lives of those often on the periphery of society, these vivid stories hold immense emotional and moral weight,” the judges said of Mushtaq and Bhasthi's ‘Heart Lamp’.
Its 12 stories set in the Muslim communities of southern India and published originally between 1990 and 2023 will now go head-to-head with authors from across the world. The annual prize celebrates the best works of long-form fiction or collections of short stories translated into English and published in the UK and/or Ireland between May 2024 and April 2025.
The six books shortlisted from the longlist for this year’s prize will be announced on April 8, with each shortlisted title awarded a prize of GBP 5,000 – shared between author and translator. The announcement of the 2025 winning title will take place May 20 at a ceremony at Tate Modern in London, with the winning author receiving GBP 25,000 and the translator or translators dividing the other half of GBP 25,000.
In 2022, Geetanjali Shree and translator Daisy Rockwell won the coveted prize for the first-ever Hindi novel ‘Tomb of Sand’, with Perumal Murugan’s Tamil novel ‘Pyre’, translated into English by Aniruddhan Vasudevan making it to the longlist in 2023.
“Translated fiction is not an elite or rarefied cultural space requiring expert knowledge; it is the exact opposite. It is stories of every conceivable kind from everywhere, for everyone. It is a miraculous way in which we might meet one another in all our strangeness and sameness, and defy the borders erected between us,” said Max Porter, chair of the judging panel for International Booker Prize 2025.
“In these books people are sharing strategies for survival; they are cheating, lying, joking and innovating. Some people are no longer of this earth, or they are sending visions from the future or from parallel universes. These books bring us into the agony of family, workplace or nation-state politics, the near-spiritual secrecy of friendship, the inner architecture of erotic feeling, the banality of capitalism and the agitations of faith,” he said.
The other titles on the longlist include: ‘The Book of Disappearance’ by Ibtisam Azem, translated from Arabic by Sinan Antoon; ‘On the Calculation of Volume I’ by Solvej Balle, translated from Danish by Barbara J. Haveland; ‘There’s a Monster Behind the Door’ by Gaëlle Bélem, translated from French by Karen Fleetwood and Laëtitia Saint-Loubert; ‘Solenoid’ by Mircea Cărtărescu, translated from Romanian by Sean Cotter;
‘Reservoir Bitches’ by Dahlia de la Cerda, translated from Spanish by Heather Cleary and Julia Sanches; ‘Small Boat’ by Vincent Delecroix, translated from French by Helen Stevenson; ‘Hunchback’ by Saou Ichikawa, translated from Japanese by Polly Barton;
‘Under the Eye of the Big Bird’ by Hiromi Kawakami, translated from Japanese by Asa Yoneda; ‘Eurotrash’ by Christian Kracht, translated from German by Daniel Bowles; ‘Perfection’ by Vincenzo Latronico, translated from Italian by Sophie Hughes; ‘On a Woman’s Madness’ by Astrid Roemer, translated from Dutch by Lucy Scott; and ‘A Leopard-Skin Hat’ by Anne Serre, translated from French by Mark Hutchinson.
Fiammetta Rocco, Administrator of the International Booker Prize, said: “The result is a longlist for anyone interested in what it means to be human, in what our planet looks like through the eyes of others, and in the power of fiction to challenge our assumptions and prejudices, and to bring different cultures together.
“Throughout, the impact that all these books have had on the judging panel is testament to the care and effort that goes into bringing them to the attention of English-language readers. The International Booker Prize offers a feast of fiction from around the world. Its work is more urgent than ever.”
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Siddaramaiah, Yatnal trade barbs in Assembly over remarks on ‘skull cap-wearing voters’
Bengaluru: Chief Minister Siddaramaiah and BJP MLA Basanagouda Patil Yatnal engaged in a heated exchange in the Karnataka Assembly after Yatnal admitted his controversial remark that he did not seek votes from people wearing skull caps.
Siddaramaiah strongly countered Yatnal’s statement, warning that such comments would politically isolate him. “If you say so, you can never become Chief Minister, nor will you come to power. In the next election, you will be completely defeated. Our votes will never go with you because you are against Scheduled Castes, against backward classes, and against minorities,” the Chief Minister said.
The verbal duel continued as Yatnal taunted Siddaramaiah, reminding him that he was once expelled from the JD(S). “Whoever gets expelled, does he become Chief Minister?” Yatnal asked.
Siddaramaiah shot back, “It will be very happy if you become a Chief Minister, but from which party will you become the CM? You have been expelled from the BJP, you build your own party if you want to become Chief Minister.”
Yatnal responded that he was ready to launch a “non-adjustment political party,” claiming it would not harm the BJP but instead benefit it. Siddaramaiah quipped that he should indeed form such a party if Congress were to gain from it.
The argument escalated further with Yatnal declaring that this would be Siddaramaiah’s last term as Chief Minister. Siddaramaiah, however, dismissed his claims and retorted, “I will not become the Chief Minister. You should not become the next Chief Minister either. For that, form a new party.”
Yatnal insisted that if Siddaramaiah steps aside, Congress votes would shift to his side. To this, Siddaramaiah firmly said, “For no reason will our votes go with them because they are opponents of Scheduled Castes, opponents of backward classes, opponents of minorities.”
At one point, Yatnal told Speaker U.T. Khader that he, would float a party. Yatnal maintained, “We are only the opponents of the traitors of the country, not the opponents of SCs.”
Seizing the moment, Siddaramaiah pressed Yatnal again: “Who openly said that we don’t want the votes of those who wear skull caps?” Yatnal admitted without hesitation, “Yes, I was the one who said I don’t want votes. What is it? I have no fear.”
Siddaramaiah then warned that such politics would only ensure Yatnal never came to power. “You will not become the Chief Minister for any reason, you will not come to power next year, you will completely lose in the next election,” he said.
Yatnal countered, claiming that the BJP would win 130 seats and replace Congress. Siddaramaiah, however, asserted that the Congress would return to power in 2028. “It is 100% true. For whatever reason, whether it is BJP or JD(S), nobody else can come to power. Yatnal is now an expelled member of the BJP, an independent. He cannot come to power.”
During the debate, Siddaramaiah also spoke about instability within the JD(S). He recalled that when he was party president, the JD(S) had won 59 seats, but that number later fell drastically to just 18. He remarked that alliances, including with the BJP, might be the only way for the JD(S) to remain politically relevant.
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