The National Book Critics Circle revealed the longlist for its Gregg Barrios Book in Translation Prize, given annually to “the best book of any genre translated into English and published in the United States.”
We Do Not Part, written by Han Kang and translated from Korean by e. yaewon and Paige Aniyah Morris, made the longlist; the novel was also nominated for the NBCC’s fiction prize. It is one of five fiction books to be longlisted, alongside The Wax Child, written by Olga Ravn and translated from Danish by Martin Aitken; Heart Lamp, written by Banu Mushtaq and translated from Kannada by Deepa Bhasthi; Near Distance, written by Hanna Stoltenberg and translated from Norwegian by Wendy H. Gabrielsen; and The Frog in the Throat, written by Markus Werner and translated from German by Michael Hofmann.
Exophony: Voyages Outside the Mother Tongue, written by Yoko Tawada and translated from Japanese by Lisa Hofmann-Kuroda, which was also nominated for the NBCC criticism prize, made the Barrios longlist, along with two other nonfiction books: Sad Tiger, written by Neige Sinno and translated from French by Natasha Lehrer, and Ugliness, written by Moshtari Hilal and translated from German by Elisabeth Lauffer.
Four volumes of poetry were nominated for the award: Bodies Found in Various Places, written by Elvira Hernández and translated from Spanish by Daniel Borzutzky and Alec Schumacher; Gaza: The Poem Said Its Piece, written by Nasser Rabah and translated from Arabic by Ammiel Alcalay, Emna Zghal and Khaled Al-Hilli; The Ruins, written by Ye Hui and translated from Chinese by Dong Li; and Wickerwork, written by Christian Lehnert and translated from German by Richard Sieburth.
The Gregg Barrios Prize, named after the late poet, playwright, and NBCC board member, was established in 2022. The previous winners are Grey Bees, written by Andrey Kurkov and translated by Boris Dralyuk; Cold Nights of Childhood, written by Tezer Özlü and translated by Maureen Freely; and A Last Supper of Queer Apostles, written by Pedro Lemebel and translated by Gwendolyn Harper.
The shortlists for the NBCC Awards will be unveiled on Jan. 20, 2026, with the winners announced at a ceremony in New York on March 26.
Michael Schaub is a contributing writer.
