Heart Lamp by Banu Mushtaq, translated from Kannada by Deepa Bhasthi, is the 2025 winner of the International Booker Prize, the award for translated fiction. The winning book, the first collection of short stories to be awarded the prize, was announced by Booker Prize-longlisted author Max Porter, Chair of the 2025 judges, at a ceremony at London’s Tate Modern on Tuesday, 20 May 2025. The International Booker Prize recognizes the vital work of translation, with the £50,000 prize money divided equally between the author and the translator.
Written between 1990 and 2023, Heart Lamp’s 12 stories chronicle the lives of women and girls in patriarchal communities in southern India. Mushtaq, a lawyer and major voice within progressive Kannada literature, is a prominent champion of women’s rights and a protester against caste and religious oppression in India, and was inspired to write the stories by the experiences of women who came to her seeking help. She becomes the second Indian author to win the International Booker Prize after Geetanjali Shree in 2022.Â
Heart Lamp is the first book translated from Kannada, a language spoken by an estimated 65 million people, to be nominated for the prize. Deepa Bhasthi becomes the first Indian translator to win the International Booker. Sheffield-based independent publisher And Other Stories wins the prize for the first time.Â
Max Porter, Chair of the International Booker Prize 2025 judges, said, “Heart Lamp is something genuinely new for English readers. A radical translation which ruffles language, to create new textures in a plurality of Englishes. It challenges and expands our understanding of translation.Â
“These beautiful, busy, life-affirming stories rise from Kannada, interspersed with the extraordinary socio-political richness of other languages and dialects. It speaks of women’s lives, reproductive rights, faith, caste, power and oppression.
“This was the book the judges really loved, right from our first reading. It’s been a joy to listen to the evolving appreciation of these stories from the different perspectives of the jury. We are thrilled to share this timely and exciting winner of the International Booker Prize 2025 with readers around the world.”
Banu Mushtaq said, “My 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 daily incidents reported in the media and the personal experiences I have endured have been my inspiration. The pain, suffering, and helpless lives of these women create a deep emotional response within me. I do not engage in extensive research; my heart itself is my field of study.” Â
Deepa Bhasthi said, “For me, translation is an instinctive practice, and each book demands a completely different process. With Banu’s stories, I first read all the fiction she had published before I narrowed it down to the ones that are in Heart Lamp. I was lucky to have a free hand in choosing what stories I wanted to work with, and Banu did not interfere with the organized chaotic way I went about it.”
