Booker: 'She Who Remains'
'She Who Remains' by Rene Karbash — first published in Bulgarian in 2018 and translated by Izidora Angel — is on the International Booker shortlist and is framed around 'the cost of living as a free woman.' (scroll.in) The profile singles out the title as one to watch for readers building a shortlist from the prize. (scroll.in)
Rene Karabash’s *She Who Remains*, translated from Bulgarian by Izidora Angel, is one of six books shortlisted for the 2026 International Booker Prize. (thebookerprizes.com) The shortlist was announced on March 31, 2026, by a judging panel chaired by Natasha Brown, and the winner is due to be named in London on May 19. The prize awards £50,000, split equally between author and translator, with £2,500 going to each shortlisted author and translator. (thebookerprizes.com) The novel is set in Albania’s Accursed Mountains and follows Bekija, who escapes an arranged marriage by becoming a sworn virgin and living as a man under the name Matija. The Booker Prize site describes it as a novel about identity, gender, love, freedom and social rules. (thebookerprizes.com) A sworn virgin is a woman who takes a public vow of celibacy and is treated socially as a man under the Kanun, a traditional code associated with northern Albania. In Karabash’s novel, that status is presented not as liberation without cost, but as a trade made under pressure. (thebookerprizes.com) (scroll.in) The 2026 shortlist includes books translated from five original languages and features five women authors and four women translators. Publishers Weekly said Karabash is one of two debut novelists on this year’s shortlist. (thebookerprizes.com) (publishersweekly.com) Karabash first published the novel in Bulgarian in 2018, and the book later won the 2019 Elias Canetti Prize in Bulgaria. The English-language edition has been published by Peirene Press in the United Kingdom. (scroll.in) (peirenepress.com) Karabash, born Irena Ivanova, is also known in Bulgaria as an actor, poet, playwright and screenwriter. Peirene Press says Angel’s translation brings the novel into English after it had already been translated into more than a dozen languages. (peirenepress.com) Scroll’s profile of the shortlist calls *She Who Remains* one of the books to watch for readers choosing where to start. By May 19, the judges will decide whether Karabash and Angel’s novel becomes the first Bulgarian-language winner of the prize. (scroll.in) (thebookerprizes.com)
