NDiaye makes Booker shortlist
Marie NDiaye’s novel The Witch, translated by Jordan Stump and published by MacLehose Press, has advanced from the longlist to the 2026 International Booker Prize shortlist. (brittlepaper.com) The entry notes the title was originally published in French in 1996 and was among a 13-title longlist announced in February. (brittlepaper.com)
Marie NDiaye’s *The Witch*, translated by Jordan Stump, is one of six books on the 2026 International Booker Prize shortlist. (thebookerprizes.com) The shortlist was announced on March 31, after judges cut the field from 13 longlisted books revealed on February 24 and 128 submissions from publishers. (thebookerprizes.com) The prize honors fiction translated into English and published in the United Kingdom or Ireland between May 1, 2025, and April 30, 2026. The £50,000 award is split equally between the author and translator, and each shortlisted title also receives £2,500 for the author and £2,500 for the translator. (thebookerprizes.com) NDiaye is on the shortlist for the first time with a novel first published in French in 1996, creating a 30-year gap between original publication and this Booker recognition. (thebookerprizes.com) The book centers on Lucie, a witch in an unhappy marriage who tries to pass her powers to her twin daughters and finds they may be stronger than she is. The Booker site describes the novel as part family story and part tale of inherited power. (thebookerprizes.com) This year’s shortlist also includes books by Shida Bazyar, Daniel Kehlmann, Hiromi Kawakami, Solvej Balle and Yáng Shuāng-zǐ, translated from five original languages. Five of the six authors and four of the six translators are women. (thebookerprizes.com) The 2026 judging panel is chaired by novelist Natasha Brown and includes Marcus du Sautoy, Sophie Hughes, Troy Onyango and Nilanjana S. Roy. Brown said the shortlisted books “reverberate with history” and carry “hope, insight and burning humanity.” (thebookerprizes.com) Stump, the translator, is a French professor at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln, which said this is his latest work to reach the International Booker shortlist. NDiaye has previously won France’s Prix Goncourt for *Three Strong Women*. (news.unl.edu, hachette.com.au) The winner will be announced on May 19 at Tate Modern in London, where NDiaye and Stump now move from contender to finalist. (publishersweekly.com)
