Indian author Geetanjali Shree’s translated Hindi novel ‘Tomb of Sand’ has won International Booker Prize award 2022. It is the first book written in an Indian language to be given this prestigious award. The book was originally published in Hindi as Ret Samadhi and it is translated into English by Daisy Rockwell
Tomb of Sand revolves around an 80-year-old widow, who suffers from depression after her the death of her husband. She visits Pakistan to face the traumas she experiences due to the partition. Geetanjali Shree and Daisy Rockwell won 50,000 pounds, which will be split between them. The book is published by Axis Press, which has won its first International Booker prize this year.
Frank Wynne, chair of judges for this year’s prize, praised the book saying that the book is “a perfectly decent beach read for absolutely everyone”. “Enormously engaging and charming and funny and light, despite the various subjects it’s dealing with … a perfectly decent beach read for absolutely everyone,” Frank Wynne was quoted as saying by The Guardian.
“Despite the fact that Britain has a very long relationship with the Indian subcontinent, very few books are translated from Indian languages, from Hindi, from Urdu, from Malayalam, from Bengali”, he added.
I think that’s a pity and I think, in part, it happens because a subsection of Indian writers write in English, and perhaps we feel that we already have the Indian writers we need but unfortunately there are many, many Indian writers of whom we’re unaware simply because they have not been translated,” Wynne remarked.
The other books that were shortlisted included The Books of Jacob by Olga Tokarczuk, translated from Polish by Jennifer Croft, Cursed Bunny by Bora Chung, translated by Anton Hur from Korean; A New Name: Septology VI-VII by Jon Fosse, translated by Damion Searls from Norwegian; Heaven by Mieka Kawakami, translated by Sam Bett and David Boyd from Japanese; and Elena Knows by Claudia Pineiro, translated by Frances Riddle from Spanish.
At Night All Blood is Black by David Diop, translated by Anna Moschovakis won the International Booker Prize award in 2021.