A Hunter College instructor has won an important international prize promoting literature written in languages other than English.
Mayada Ibrahim, who teaches literary translation in the Arabic program, was among the winners of the inaugural PEN Presents x International Booker Prize grant for her co-translation with Najlaa Eltom of Ireme, an intimate, intergenerational family saga by Sudanese author Stella Gaitano.
Ibrahim’s translation from the Arabic is now available to read on the English PEN website; the organization will promote it to publishers and commissioning editors in the United Kingdom and across the Anglophone world. The five winners represented five languages and five regions.
“It is wonderful to see Professor Ibrahim’s work receive the recognition it deserves from such an important international organization as English PEN,” Arabic Program Head Alexander Elinson. “Our students are so fortunate to have the opportunity to study literary translation with her.”
The accomplishment illustrates Hunter’s commitment to serving as an anchor institution promoting high-impact, world-changing work by diverse instructors.
The PEN Presents x International Booker Prize was launched by English PEN last year so that more literature in translation in underrepresented languages could reach English-language readers. The International Booker Prize is an award for the best work of fiction translated into English and published in the United Kingdom and Ireland.
“It’s exciting that so many of this inaugural cohort of talented winners might bring a new readership to these works,” said English Pen Head of Literature Programs Will Forrester.
Based in Queens, with roots in Khartoum and London, Ibrahim has had translations nominated for the Pushcart Prize and published by Dolce Stil Criollo, 128 Lit, Foundry Editions, and Willows House in South Sudan. Ibrahim is managing editor at 52 Walker, an independent publisher of contemporary literature, and received a bachelor’s degree in comparative literature from Queen Mary, University of London.
“It’s a thrill and an honor to be bringing Ireme into English, and to be working with two writers I deeply admire, and for whom the novel resonates personally,” Ibrahim said. “I’m grateful to English PEN and the International Booker Prize for this initiative and for their championing of literary translation.”
