Geetanjali Shree wins PEN Translates award for 'Once Elephants Lived Here'

New Delhi: International Booker prize winning Hindi author Geetanjali Shree's Once Elephants Lived Here, translated from the Hindi by Daisy Rockwell, has been named one of the 14 titles to win the PEN Translates award, English PEN announced on Thursday.

The London-based human rights organisation has selected 14 titles in 13 languages from 11 regions across the world.

Among the winners, featured through the PEN Translates x SALT collaboration, are Once Elephants Lived Here by Geetanjali Shree, translated from the Hindi by Daisy Rockwell, and Eyes, Eyes, Eyes by Pakistani poet Sara Shagufta, translated from the Urdu by Javeria Hasnain.

This strand of PEN Translates, in partnership with the SALT project at the University of Chicago, is open to works of South Asian literature in English translation published anywhere outside the region.

Shree's collection of short stories explores themes of memory, loss, displacement, and how societal changes impact individuals.

"So wonderful to have dedicated translators like Daisy Rockwell who is taking the literature of one place far and wide into the world, setting off such a rich cultural exchange. This is what we need to live together in happy plurality and end the hates around that are causing wars and dividing peoples," Shree told PTI.

The winners are selected by an independent cross-sector selection panel "on the basis of their outstanding literary quality, the strength of the publishing project, and their contribution to UK bibliodiversity".

The latest round of PEN Translates recognises essay collections, short stories, speculative fiction, and novellas, with themes ranging from postpartum experience to reflections on genocide.

Preti Taneja, co-chair of the English PEN Translation Advisory Group and Chair of the PEN Translates x SALT Selection Panel, said that the high quality of the applications presented the panel with the best translations by new and established voices.

"...and showed a commitment to publishing work that will rightly elevate a writer’s - and their translator’s - reputation among Anglophone readers. These projects contribute to bibliodiversity in exciting ways, as well as being of the highest literary merit. I know the finished books will go on to enthral and inspire English-language readers around the world," she said in a statement.

The list of winning titles included anthologies from Ukraine, Palestine, and Latin America.

Other winners of the PEN Translates award include Children of the Dew by Mohammad Al-As’ad (Palestine), translated from the Arabic by Anaheed Al-Hardan and Maia Tabet; Chilco by Daniela Catrileo (Chile), translated from the Spanish by Jacob Edelstein; The Backstreet of Memory by Conceição Evaristo (Brazil), translated from the Portuguese by Annie McDermott; Jacaranda by Gaël Faye (Rwanda/France), translated from the French by Sarah Ardizzone; The History of Vertebrates by Mar García Puig (Spain), translated from the Catalan by Mara Faye Lethem; and Across the Ice by Peter Kurzeck (Germany), translated from the German by Imogen Taylor.

On Earth as it is Beneath by Ana Paula Maia (Brazil), translated from the Portuguese by Padma Viswanathan; Lamento by Madame Neilsen (Denmark), translated from the Danish by Gaye Kynoch; Disappearing Acts by Maria Stepanova (Russia), translated from the Russian by Sasha Dugdale; Take Six: Six Ukrainian Women (Ukraine), translated from the Ukrainian by Stephen Komarnyckyj; Palestine Minus One (Palestine), translated from the Arabic; and La Lucha: Latin American Feminism Today, translated from Spanish, Portuguese, Mapuche and Quechua have also won the prestigious award.

The works by Mohammed Al-As’ad, Conceição Evaristo, and Peter Kurzeck are their respective first English publications.

"There’s so much ambition and scope to celebrate, starting with first English publications for globally renowned writers Mohammed Al-As’ad, Conceição Evaristo, and Peter Kurzeck. Like these writers, Daniela Catrileo, Gaël Faye, Mar García Puig, Ana Paula Maia, Madame Neilsen and Maria Stepanova push at the boundaries where fiction and non-fiction meet in profound truths.

"That resonates across three anthologies compiled by Comma Press, Dedalus Books and Charco Press, which offer dispatches of the most urgent and dynamic contemporary writing from Palestine, Ukraine and across Latin America. We’re proud that through them we can support dozens of experienced and emerging translators," So Mayer, English PEN Translation Advisory Co-chair and Chair of the PEN Translates Selection Panel, said.

The PEN Translates-supported title Heart Lamp by Banu Mushtaq, translated from the Kannada by Deepa Bhasthi, recently won the 2025 International Booker Prize.