See the 2020 International Booker Prize Shortlist

by |April 3, 2020
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The 2020 International Booker Prize shortlist was revealed last night, with authors such as Yoko Ogawa and previous Stella Prize nominee Shokoofeh Azar making the list.

The International Booker Prize celebrates translated fiction from across the world, with the author and the translator of the winning book receiving £50,000 between them. This year, the shortlist features novels translated from five languages: Spanish, German, Dutch, Farsi and Japanese.

The 2020 judges – Ted Hodgkinson, Lucie Campos, Jennifer Croft, Valeria Luiselli and Jeet Thayil – considered 124 books for this year’s International Booker Prize.

Panel Chair Ted Hodgkinson said of the shortlist:

‘Each of our shortlisted books restlessly reinvents received narratives, from foundational myths to family folklore, plunging us into discomforting and elating encounters with selves in a state of transition. Whether capturing a deftly imagined dystopia or incandescent flows of language, these are tremendous feats of translation, which in these isolating times, represent the pinnacle of an art- form rooted in dialogue. Our shortlist transcends this unprecedented moment, immersing us in expansively imagined lives that hold enduring fascination.’

The winner will be announced on the 19th of May. Read on for the shortlist!


The Enlightenment of the Greengage Tree

by Shokoofeh Azar (Farsi, Iran), translated by Anonymous

9780987381309

This book is an extraordinarily powerful and evocative literary novel set in Iran in the period immediately after the Islamic Revolution in 1979. Using the lyrical magic realism style of classical Persian storytelling, Azar draws the reader deep into the heart of a family caught in the maelstrom of post-revolutionary chaos and brutality that sweeps across an ancient land and its people.

Buy it here


The Adventures of China Iron

by Gabriela Cabezón Cámara (Spanish-Argentina), translated by Iona Macintyre and Fiona Mackintosh

9781916465664

The pampas of Argentina. China is a young woman eking out an existence in a remote gaucho encampment. After her no-good husband is conscripted into the army, China bolts for freedom, setting off on a wagon journey through the pampas in the company of her new-found friend Liz, a settler from Scotland. While Liz provides China with a sentimental education and schools her in the nefarious ways of the British Empire, their eyes are opened to the wonders of Argentina’s richly diverse flora and fauna, cultures and languages, as well as to the ruthless violence involved in nation-building.

This subversive retelling of Argentina’s foundational gaucho epic Martin Fierro is a celebration of the colour and movement of the living world, the open road, love and sex, and the dream of lasting freedom.

Buy it here


Tyll

by Daniel Kehlmann (Germany-German), translated by Ross Benjamin

9781529403664

He’s a trickster, a player, a jester. His handshake’s like a pact with the devil, his smile like a crack in the clouds; he’s watching you now and he’s gone when you turn. Tyll Ulenspiegel is here!

With macabre humour and moving humanity, Daniel Kehlmann lifts this legend from medieval German folklore and enters him on the stage of the Thirty Years’ War. When citizens become the playthings of politics and puppetry, Tyll, in his demonic grace and his thirst for freedom, is the very spirit of rebellion – a cork in water, a laugh in the dark, a hero for all time.

Buy it here


Hurricane Season

by Fernanda Melchor (Spanish-Mexico), translated by Sophie Hughes

9781922268006

Inspired by a real event of the murder of a woman in rural Mexico, Hurricane Season takes place in a world filled with superstitions and violence-violence that poisons everything around.

The Witch is dead. After a group of children playing in the murky waters of the irrigation canals discover her decomposing corpse, the village is rife with rumours and suspicions about the murder of this feared and respected woman, who had carried out the community’s ritual shamanic customs. In dazzling, visceral language, Melchor extracts humanity from otherwise irredeemably brutal characters, and spins a terrifying and heartrending tale of dark suspense in a Mexican village that seems damned.

Buy it here


The Memory Police

by Yoko Ogawa (Japanese-Japan), translated by Stephen Snyder

9781787300750

Hat, ribbon, bird, rose. To the people on the island, a disappeared thing no longer has any meaning. It can be burned in the garden, thrown in the river or handed over to the Memory Police. Soon enough, the island forgets it ever existed. When a young novelist discovers that her editor is in danger of being taken away by the Memory Police, she desperately wants to save him. For some reason, he doesn’t forget, and it’s becoming increasingly difficult for him to hide his memories. Who knows what will vanish next?

The Memory Police is a beautiful, haunting and provocative fable about the power of memory and the trauma of loss, from one of Japan’s greatest writers.

Buy it here


The Discomfort of Evening

by Marieke Lucas Rijneveld (Dutch-Netherlands), translated by Michele Hutchison

9780571349364

I asked God if he please couldn’t take my brother Matthies instead of my rabbit. ‘Amen.’

Ten-year-old Jas has a unique way of experiencing her universe: the feeling of udder ointment on her skin as protection against harsh winters; the texture of green warts, like capers, on migrating toads; the sound of ‘blush words’ that aren’t in the Bible. But when a tragic accident ruptures the family, her curiosity warps into a vortex of increasingly disturbing fantasies – unlocking a darkness that threatens to derail them all.

A bestselling sensation in the Netherlands, Marieke Lucas Rijneveld’s radical debut novel is studded with images of wild, violent beauty: a world of language unlike any other.

Buy it here


Congratulations to all of the authors on the 2020 International Booker Prize shortlist!

Find out more about the International Booker Prize here

Award-Winning Fiction - View the Collection

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About the Contributor

Olivia Fricot (she/her) is Booktopia's Senior Content Producer and editor of the Booktopian blog. She has too many plants and not enough bookshelves, and you can usually find her reading, baking, or talking to said plants. She is pro-Oxford comma.

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