Ghayath Almadhoun and Catherine Cobham Win 2026 National Translation Award

OCTOBER 23, 2026 — One title translated from Arabic was on the longlists for the 2026 National Translation Awards in Poetry and Prose, and that one title — I Have Brought You a Severed Hand, written by Ghayath Almadhoun and translated by Catherine Cobham — won the poetry category award.

This year’s judges for poetry are Karen Kovacik, Karen Leeder, and Robyn Creswell.

The judges wrote of the winning title:

Ghayath Almadhoun’s I Have Brought You a Severed Hand are war poems for the twentieth-first century, full of rage and wit and terrible truths. He writes of the violence in Syria from the frontlines of immigration in Europe—from self-satisfied Stockholm and the artsy precincts of Berlin—and he brings the news that no one wants to hear. “I have brought you cities destroyed on top of their inhabitants so you can reconstruct them,” “I have brought you sarin gas so you can breathe deeply.” The translations of Catherine Cobham move fluidly among the many registers of the Arabic: argument and aphorism, surreal imagery and searing analysis.

The winners of the National Translation Awards in Poetry and Prose receive a $4,000 prize each. This year’s winner in the prose category was I Gave You Eyes and You Looked Toward Darkness, written by Irene Solà translated by Mara Faye Lethem.