Izidora Angel credits PEN/Heim grant
- PEN America published an April 28 interview with translator Izidora Angel, who said a PEN/Heim grant helped carry She Who Remains to the 2026 International Booker shortlist. - Angel said the grant’s judges’ citation gave her language to pitch the book and confidence to ask publisher Peirene Press for a Booker submission. - The fund gives 10 translation projects $4,000 each and says about 20% of published recipients reach major award lists. (pen.org)
Translator Izidora Angel said a PEN/Heim Translation Fund Grant helped push *She Who Remains* from an in-progress translation to the 2026 International Booker shortlist. (pen.org) PEN America published the interview on April 28, 2026, a day after highlighting how the grant backed Angel’s English translation of Rene Karabash’s Bulgarian novel. (pen.org) Angel said the judges’ citation for the grant gave her words she could use to describe the book and the confidence to ask Peirene Press to nominate it for the International Booker Prize. (pen.org) The book was shortlisted for the 2026 International Booker Prize after being published by Peirene Press on February 10, 2026. The winner is due to be announced on May 19, 2026. (thebookerprizes.com 1) (thebookerprizes.com 2) (peirenepress.com) *She Who Remains* follows Bekja, a teenage girl in rural Albania who escapes an arranged marriage by becoming a sworn virgin and living as a man under the name Matija. (thebookerprizes.com) Booker judges called it “an unforgettable modern fairy tale,” while PEN quoted the earlier PEN/Heim judges’ description of the novel as “darkly fascinating and poetic.” (thebookerprizes.com) (pen.org) The PEN/Heim Translation Fund was created in 2003 to increase the number of literary translations published in English. PEN says it now awards 10 grants of $4,000 each. (pen.org) PEN says the fund has supported nearly 200 translations from more than 35 languages, with preference for early-career translators, underrepresented writers, and underrepresented languages. (pen.org) Among projects funded in the program’s first 13 years, PEN says 91 of 108 were published or forthcoming, and about 20% of published projects won or were shortlisted for major literary awards. (pen.org) Angel called *She Who Remains* “such an Indie hit success story.” Her account turns a small translation grant into a concrete part of how a Bulgarian novel reached English-language prize readers. (pen.org)
