Heart Lamp by Banu Mushtaq, translated from Kannada by Deepa Bhasthi, was named the 2025 winner of the International Booker Prize, the world’s most influential award for translated fiction.
The winning book, the first collection of short stories to be awarded the prize, was announced by bestselling Booker Prize-longlisted author Max Porter, Chair of the 2025 judges, at a ceremony on May 20 in the Turbine Hall at London’s Tate Modern. T
The International Booker Prize recognises the vital work of translation, with the £50,000 prize money divided equally between the author and the translator. Each received a trophy, presented by Porter.
Highlights of the evening included a special music performance of ‘Pass in Time’ by award-winning singer-songwriter Beth Orton, who is a judge for the 2025 prize, and a screening of six short films starring critically-acclaimed actors Lucy Boynton, Jamie Demetriou, Omari Douglas, Rosalind Eleazar, and Peter Serafinowicz performing extracts from the shortlisted books, with the winning title read by Ambika Mod. The announcement of the winner was shared with a global audience via a livestream on the Booker Prizes’ YouTube, Instagram and TikTok channels.
The event also featured red-carpet interviews with high-profile guests by comedian Suzi Ruffell, for the Booker Prizes’ social accounts.
12 short stories
The winning collection of 12 short stories chronicles the resilience, resistance, wit, and sisterhood of everyday women in patriarchal communities in southern India, vividly brought to life through a rich tradition of oral storytelling. From tough, stoic mothers to opinionated grandmothers, from cruel husbands to resilient children, the female characters in the stories endure great inequities and hardships but remain defiant.
Winning author Mushtaq, a lawyer and major voice within progressive Kannada literature, is a prominent champion of women’s rights and a protester against the caste and class system in India. She was inspired to write the stories by the experiences of women who came to her seeking help.
The stories in ‘Heart Lamp,’ which is the first winner of the International Booker Prize to be translated from Kannada, spoken by an estimated 65 million people, 38 million as a first language, were written by Mushtaq over a period of 30-plus years, from 1990 to 2023. They were selected and curated by Bhasthi, who was keen to preserve the multi-lingual nature of southern India. When the characters use Urdu or Arabic words in conversation, these are left in the original, reproducing the unique rhythms of spoken language.
The winning book, Heart Lamp, “is something genuinely new for English readers: a radical translation” of “beautiful, busy, life-affirming stories”, according to Max Porter, Chair of the 2025 judges.
Highlights
- ‘Heart Lamp’ is the first collection of short stories to win the prize – written over 30 years, the 12 stories chronicle the lives of women in patriarchal communities in southern India
- Lawyer and women’s rights activist Banu Mushtaq is the second Indian author to win the prize
- Deepa Bhasthi becomes the first Indian translator to win the prize, and describes her process for Heart Lamp as ‘translating with an accent’
- ‘Heart Lamp’ is the first winner of the International Booker Prize to be translated from Kannada, a major language spoken by an estimated 65 million people
- Mushtaq was inspired to write the stories by those who came to her seeking help. She said: “The pain, suffering, and helpless lives of these women create a deep emotional response within me, compelling me to write.”
