35 h. ago ‘My legal work sows the seeds of my stories’: International Booker prize winner Banu Mushtaq

The author and activist, who was subject to a fatwa in 2000, has won the prestigious prize for translated fiction for her short stories about the lives of Muslim women. She and her translator Deepa Bhasthi explain how Heart Lamp’s themes ‘are universal’• ‘Radical translation’ of Heart Lamp by Banu Mushtaq wins International Booker prize‘Human beings and their basic nature are the same everywhere,” Banu Mushtaq says. “That is the intention of my writing. The theme is woman, the theme is marginalised people, the theme is to be a voice to the voiceless community.”Mushtaq, from the Karnataka region of southern India, has been “awake all night”, she says, as we speak on the morning after she won the International Booker prize in London for her book Heart Lamp. The prize is shared between Mushtaq and her translator Deepa Bhasthi, who is also present – and also had no sleep. Continue reading...

Politics

4 d. ago International Booker Prize 2025: Banu Mushtaq wins for book ‘challenging Western stereotypes about Muslim life’

The 12 short stories, translated by Deepa Bhasthi, follow the lives of ordinary women living in southern India

Politics

4 d. ago ‘Radical translation’ of Heart Lamp by Banu Mushtaq wins International Booker prize

Translator Deepa Bhasthi’s pick of 12 of Mushtaq’s ‘life-affirming’ tales about women’s lives in southern India becomes the first short story collection to win the £50,000 awardHeart Lamp by Banu Mushtaq, translated by Deepa Bhasthi, has won this year’s International Booker prize for translated fiction, becoming the first short story collection to take the award. The stories were originally written in Kannada, the official language of the state of Karnataka in southern India.Described by the author and chair of judges Max Porter as “something genuinely new for English readers: a radical translation” of “beautiful, busy, life-affirming stories”, Heart Lamp’s 12 tales chronicle the lives of women in patriarchal communities in southern India. They were selected as well as translated by Bhasthi, the first Indian translator to win the award. She chose them from around 50 stories in six collections written by Mushtaq over a 30-year-period. Continue reading...

Politics

7 d. ago Voices: Readers torn over Bella Hadid’s call for menstrual leave – ‘try working a 12

Our community remain divided over the suggestion women shouldn’t work during their periods, with many sharing personal stories of endometriosis, PCOS, and other debilitating symptoms

Politics

1 week ago There is suffering everywhere you look, says mother of emaciated baby girl trapped in Gaza

Babies such as Siwar Ashour are suffering from malnutrition as crucial supplies run out amid Israel’s total blockade on aidSiwar Ashour was born into war and hunger and has known nothing else. She is now in real danger of dying without ever having known a moment of peace or contentment.The six-month-old Palestinian girl, whose painfully emaciated body symbolised the deliberate starvation of Gaza when she appeared on the BBC this week, was only 2.5kg when she was born on 20 November last year. Continue reading...

Politics

1 week ago A picture that shocked the world: the story behind baby Siwar Ashour

Six-month-old Palestinian girl’s painfully emaciated body symbolised starvation on GazaSiwar Ashour was born into war and hunger and has known nothing else. She is now in real danger of dying without ever having known a moment of peace or contentment.The six-month-old Palestinian girl, whose painfully emaciated body symbolised the deliberate starvation of Gaza when she appeared on the BBC this week, was only 2.5kg when she was born on 20 November last year. Continue reading...

Events

2 w. ago I was Hitler’s neighbour: ‘If he’d known we were Jewish, we’d have been sent to Dachau’

In 1929, Edgar Feuchtwanger was five years old and living with his family in Munich when Adolf Hitler moved into a flat opposite. At first, his parents thought they were safe hiding in plain sight – until they weren’tThe odds were against Edgar Feuchtwanger reaching the age of 100. He was born on 28 September 1924 into a time of poverty and political turmoil in post-first world war Germany. He was also born into a Jewish family in a society that was about to turn to National Socialism, an ideology that would ultimately be responsible for the murder of 6 million Jews. In 1929, when Feuchtwanger was five, something happened that made his long life even more unlikely. He got a new neighbour: Adolf Hitler.In October that year, Hitler moved into the grand second-floor flat at Prinzregentenplatz 16 in Munich. His previous flat, on the other side of the Isar, the river that divides Munich, had become too small. Munich to him was the “Capital of the Movement”, a title he awar...

Events

2 w. ago 'Victory' babies born as Second World War ended celebrate turning 80

Dozens were given the names Victor or Winston

Events

2 w. ago Brian May nearly choked on his goats cheese: my adventures with the cosmic dads of rock’n’roll

Kevin Ayers wanted romance, Johnny Rotten worried about his dangly bits Ageing rockers are Kate Mossman’s speciality. Here’s what she’s learned from meeting themYoung musicians have so little to say. Give me a rocker in his later years any day. Ask him about his childhood, his relationship with his mum, his painful lifelong love affair with his lead guitarist. Many belong to a specific anthropological group: born after the war, they got their first guitars on hire purchase and went on to date the aristocracy. They became my specialist subject as a journalist: it was impossible to resist the combination of vulnerability, extreme oddness and sharp business nous I found in so many, while others were living in strangely compromised circumstances despite years of deathless hits. I was particularly drawn to those who had continued a career under the radar, or who had slipped under it but hadn’t quite noticed.It was a strange subject to pursue, but always a labour of love – because on some...

Politics

2 w. ago ‘I’m burping? At least I didn’t fart!’ Ten things I’ve learned about ageing rockers

From Gene Simmons discussing lowgrade meatballs to Shaun Ryder comparing himself to Uncle Fester, Kate Mossman has spent her life interviewing rock stars of a certain age. What has she learned?Young musicians have so little to say. Give me a rocker in his later years any day. Ask him about his childhood, his relationship with his mum, his painful lifelong love affair with his lead guitarist. Many belong to a specific anthropological group: born after the war, they got their first guitars on hire purchase and went on to date the aristocracy. They became my specialist subject as a journalist: it was impossible to resist the combination of vulnerability, extreme oddness and sharp business nous I found in so many, while others were living in strangely compromised circumstances despite years of deathless hits. I was particularly drawn to those who had continued a career under the radar, or who had slipped under it but hadn’t quite noticed.It was a strange subject to pursue, but always a ...

Politics

2 w. ago Survival and stoicism: stories of women born before the second world war

Christian Doyle’s series Quietly Getting On focuses on women in their late 80s and 90s, their memories of a wartime childhood and how they live nowAs a way of maintaining contact with my elderly neighbours during the Covid restrictions of 2020, we set up a project where each person held up a card showing the age they felt inside. From their life stories, a new idea formed in my mind.This is a generation of women who had experienced first-hand the impact of war on the domestic front, who had been evacuated to strangers across the country, not seeing their parents for months on end. Maybe these experiences created a different mindset; a resilience and stoicism, where the self is less important than being part of a community. Continue reading...

Events

3 w. ago British woman now world’s oldest person shares the secret to long life

Ethel was born before the First World War

Politics

3 w. ago Heather Graham eyes own production company to combat Hollywood sexism

EXCLUSIVE The actress has expanded into writing and directing in recent years and would ‘love’ to take it to the next level ala Reese Witherspoon and Margot Robbie, to address ‘huge market for women’s voices and stories’

Politics

4 w. ago Musician tells the stories of 10 women imprisoned for killing their abusers

Vivir Quintana is using a typically male genre of music to sing for incarcerated women

Events