A Hunter College adjunct instructor was short-listed for the prestigious PEN Presents x International Booker Prize.
Mayada Ibrahim, who teaches literary translation in the Arabic program, made the list for a proposed sample of Ireme, an intimate, intergenerational family saga by Sudanese author Stella Gaitano. The co-translator is Najlaa Eltom.
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.
The accomplishment illustrates Hunter’s commitment to serving as an anchor institution promoting high-impact, world-changing work by diverse instructors.
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 Tilted Axis Press, an independent publisher of contemporary literature, and received a bachelor’s degree in comparative literature from Queen Mary, University of London.
Translators were invited to submit proposals to create a 5,000-word sample translation of an untranslated work of long-form fiction or collections of short stories by any author, from any language or region, and of any style, genre and era.
Those who made the shortlist get the equivalent of about $700 to fund their sample translations, as well as exposure among British and Irish publishers. The shortlist features 12 titles, 13 translators, nine languages, and nine territories.
A panel will select six projects as PEN Presents x International Booker Prize winners and expects to publish the samples and promote them to UK publishers in the summer.
