Every Dublin Literary Award winner, 1996–2026

The Dublin Literary Award has gone to 31 books since 1996. Public libraries around the world nominate novels written in or translated into English, and an international panel of judges picks the shortlist and winner; it was the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award until 2015. When a translated book wins, the €100,000 prize is split, €75,000 to the writer and €25,000 to the translator. The latest winner is Gliff by Ali Smith (2026). Of the 27 winners on ReadingRate, the most readable is Family Life by Akhil Sharma (difficulty 46/100, about 3.6 hours); the hardest is Solar Bones by Mike McCormack (76/100). The quickest of them to finish is The Adversary by Michael Crummey, at about 2.8 hours.

How book difficulty is measured

2026

• Gliff by Ali Smith — difficulty 54/100, about 3.7 hours
• Perspective(s) by Laurent Binet, translated by Sam Taylor — shortlist
• In Late Summer (U kasno ljeto) by Magdalena Blažević, translated by Anđelka Raguž — shortlist
• What I Know About You (Ce que je sais de toi) by Éric Chacour, translated by Pablo Strauss — shortlist
• Live Fast (Vivre vite) by Brigitte Giraud, translated by Cory Stockwell — shortlist
• The Emperor of Gladness by Ocean Vuong — shortlist

2025

• The Adversary by Michael Crummey — difficulty 56/100, about 2.8 hours
• James by Percival Everett — shortlist
• North Woods by Daniel Mason — shortlist
• Not a River (No es un río) by Selva Almada, translated by Annie McDermott — shortlist
• Prophet Song by Paul Lynch — shortlist
• We Are Light (Wij zijn licht) by Gerda Blees, translated by Michele Hutchison — shortlist

2024

• Solenoid by Mircea Cărtărescu, translated by Sean Cotter — difficulty 68/100, about 22 hours
• Old God's Time by Sebastian Barry — shortlist
• Haven by Emma Donoghue — shortlist
• If I Survive You by Jonathan Escoffery — shortlist
• The Sleeping Car Porter by Suzette Mayr — shortlist
• Praiseworthy by Alexis Wright — shortlist

2023

• Marzahn, Mon Amour by Katja Oskamp, translated by Jo Heinrich
• Cloud Cuckoo Land by Anthony Doerr — shortlist
• The Trees by Percival Everett — shortlist
• Paradais by Fernanda Melchor, translated by Sophie Hughes — shortlist
• Love Novel (Ljubavni roman) by Ivana Sajko, translated by Mima Simić — shortlist
• Em by Kim Thúy, translated by Sheila Fischman — shortlist

2022

• The Art of Losing (L'Art de perdre) by Alice Zeniter, translated by Frank Wynne
• Remote Sympathy by Catherine Chidgey — shortlist
• At Night All Blood Is Black (Frère d'âme) by David Diop, translated by Anna Moschovakis — shortlist
• The Death of Vivek Oji by Akwaeke Emezi — shortlist
• The Art of Falling by Danielle McLaughlin — shortlist
• Noopiming: The Cure for White Ladies by Leanne Betasamosake Simpson — shortlist

2021

• Lost Children Archive by Valeria Luiselli — difficulty 62/100, about 9.4 hours
• Girl, Woman, Other by Bernardine Evaristo — shortlist
• Apeirogon by Colum McCann — shortlist
• Hurricane Season (Temporada de huracanes) by Fernanda Melchor, translated by Sophie Hughes — shortlist
• On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous by Ocean Vuong — shortlist
• The Nickel Boys by Colson Whitehead — shortlist

2020

• Milkman by Anna Burns — difficulty 72/100, about 14 hours
• The Silence of the Girls by Pat Barker — shortlist
• Disoriental (Désorientale) by Négar Djavadi, translated by Tina Kover — shortlist
• Washington Black by Esi Edugyan — shortlist
• An American Marriage by Tayari Jones — shortlist
• History of Violence (Histoire de la violence) by Édouard Louis, translated by Lorin Stein — shortlist
• The Friend by Sigrid Nunez — shortlist
• There There by Tommy Orange — shortlist
• All the Lives We Never Lived by Anuradha Roy — shortlist
• Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead (Prowadź swój pług przez kości umarłych) by Olga Tokarczuk, translated by Antonia Lloyd-Jones — shortlist

2019

• Idaho by Emily Ruskovich
• Compass (Boussole) by Mathias Énard, translated by Charlotte Mandell — shortlist
• History of Wolves by Emily Fridlund — shortlist
• Exit West by Mohsin Hamid — shortlist
• Midwinter Break by Bernard MacLaverty — shortlist
• Reservoir 13 by Jon McGregor — shortlist
• Conversations with Friends by Sally Rooney — shortlist
• Lincoln in the Bardo by George Saunders — shortlist
• A Boy in Winter by Rachel Seiffert — shortlist
• Home Fire by Kamila Shamsie — shortlist

2018

• Solar Bones by Mike McCormack — difficulty 76/100, about 11 hours
• Baba Dunja's Last Love (Baba Dunjas letzte Liebe) by Alina Bronsky, translated by Tim Mohr — shortlist
• The Transmigration of Bodies (La transmigración de los cuerpos) by Yuri Herrera, translated by Lisa Dillman — shortlist
• The Unseen (De usynlige) by Roy Jacobsen, translated by Don Bartlett and Don Shaw — shortlist
• Human Acts (소년이 온다) by Han Kang, translated by Deborah Smith — shortlist
• The Lesser Bohemians by Eimear McBride — shortlist
• Distant Light (La lucina) by Antonio Moresco, translated by Richard Dixon — shortlist
• Ladivine by Marie NDiaye, translated by Jordan Stump — shortlist
• The Woman Next Door by Yewande Omotoso — shortlist
• My Name Is Lucy Barton by Elizabeth Strout — shortlist

2017

• A General Theory of Oblivion (Teoria Geral do Esquecimento) by José Eduardo Agualusa, translated by Daniel Hahn — difficulty 48/100, about 4 hours
• Confession of the Lioness (A Confissão da Leoa) by Mia Couto, translated by David Brookshaw — shortlist
• The Green Road by Anne Enright — shortlist
• The Prophets of Eternal Fjord (Profeterne i Evighedsfjorden) by Kim Leine, translated by Martin Aitken — shortlist
• The Story of My Teeth (La historia de mis dientes) by Valeria Luiselli, translated by Christina MacSweeney — shortlist
• The Sympathizer by Viet Thanh Nguyen — shortlist
• Under the Udala Trees by Chinelo Okparanta — shortlist
• A Strangeness in My Mind (Kafamda Bir Tuhaflık) by Orhan Pamuk, translated by Ekin Oklap — shortlist
• A Whole Life (Ein ganzes Leben) by Robert Seethaler, translated by Charlotte Collins — shortlist
• A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara — shortlist

2016

• Family Life by Akhil Sharma — difficulty 46/100, about 3.6 hours
• Outlaws (Las leyes de la frontera) by Javier Cercas, translated by Anne McLean — shortlist
• Academy Street by Mary Costello — shortlist
• Your Fathers, Where Are They? And the Prophets, Do They Live Forever? by Dave Eggers — shortlist
• The End of Days (Aller Tage Abend) by Jenny Erpenbeck, translated by Susan Bernofsky — shortlist
• A Brief History of Seven Killings by Marlon James — shortlist
• Diary of the Fall (Diário da Queda) by Michel Laub, translated by Margaret Jull Costa — shortlist
• Our Lady of the Nile (Notre-Dame du Nil) by Scholastique Mukasonga, translated by Melanie Mauthner — shortlist
• Dept. of Speculation by Jenny Offill — shortlist
• Lila by Marilynne Robinson — shortlist

2015

• Harvest by Jim Crace — difficulty 56/100, about 5 hours
• Americanah by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie — shortlist
• Horses of God (Les étoiles de Sidi Moumen) by Mahi Binebine, translated by Lulu Norman — shortlist
• The Narrow Road to the Deep North by Richard Flanagan — shortlist
• Burial Rites by Hannah Kent — shortlist
• K. by Bernardo Kucinski, translated by Sue Branford — shortlist
• Brief Loves That Live Forever (Le Livre des brèves amours éternelles) by Andreï Makine, translated by Geoffrey Strachan — shortlist
• TransAtlantic by Colum McCann — shortlist
• Someone by Alice McDermott — shortlist
• Sparta by Roxana Robinson — shortlist

2014

• The Sound of Things Falling (El ruido de las cosas al caer) by Juan Gabriel Vásquez, translated by Anne McLean — difficulty 60/100, about 5.5 hours
• The Detour (De omweg) by Gerbrand Bakker, translated by David Colmer — shortlist
• Questions of Travel by Michelle de Kretser — shortlist
• The Garden of Evening Mists by Tan Twan Eng — shortlist
• Absolution by Patrick Flanery — shortlist
• A Death in the Family (Min kamp 1) by Karl Ove Knausgård, translated by Don Bartlett — shortlist
• Three Strong Women (Trois Femmes puissantes) by Marie NDiaye, translated by John Fletcher — shortlist
• Traveller of the Century (El viajero del siglo) by Andrés Neuman, translated by Nick Caistor and Lorenza Garcia — shortlist
• The Light of Amsterdam by David Park — shortlist
• The Spinning Heart by Donal Ryan — shortlist

2013

• City of Bohane by Kevin Barry — difficulty 51/100, about 4.6 hours
• The Map and the Territory (La carte et le territoire) by Michel Houellebecq, translated by Gavin Bowd — shortlist
• Pure by Andrew Miller — shortlist
• 1Q84 by Haruki Murakami, translated by Jay Rubin and Philip Gabriel — shortlist
• The Buddha in the Attic by Julie Otsuka — shortlist
• The Tragedy of Arthur by Arthur Phillips — shortlist
• Swamplandia! by Karen Russell — shortlist
• From the Mouth of the Whale (Rökkurbýsnir) by Sjón, translated by Victoria Cribb — shortlist
• The Faster I Walk, the Smaller I Am (Jo fortere jeg går, jo mindre er jeg) by Kjersti Annesdatter Skomsvold, translated by Kerri Pierce — shortlist
• Caesarion by Tommy Wieringa, translated by Sam Garrett — shortlist

2012

• Even the Dogs by Jon McGregor — difficulty 55/100, about 4.7 hours
• Rocks in the Belly by Jon Bauer — shortlist
• The Matter with Morris by David Bergen — shortlist
• A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan — shortlist
• The Memory of Love by Aminatta Forna — shortlist
• Matterhorn by Karl Marlantes — shortlist
• Landed by Tim Pears — shortlist
• Limassol (לימסול) by Yishai Sarid, translated by Barbara Harshav — shortlist
• The Eternal Son (O Filho Eterno) by Cristóvão Tezza, translated by Alison Entrekin — shortlist
• Lean on Pete by Willy Vlautin — shortlist

2011

• Let the Great World Spin by Colum McCann — difficulty 52/100, about 8.8 hours
• Galore by Michael Crummey — shortlist
• The Lacuna by Barbara Kingsolver — shortlist
• The Vagrants by Yiyun Li — shortlist
• Ransom by David Malouf — shortlist
• Little Bird of Heaven by Joyce Carol Oates — shortlist
• Jasper Jones by Craig Silvey — shortlist
• Brooklyn by Colm Tóibín — shortlist
• Love and Summer by William Trevor — shortlist
• After the Fire, A Still Small Voice by Evie Wyld — shortlist

2010

• The Twin (Boven is het stil) by Gerbrand Bakker, translated by David Colmer
• The Elegance of the Hedgehog (L'Élégance du hérisson) by Muriel Barbery, translated by Alison Anderson — shortlist
• In Zodiac Light by Robert Edric — shortlist
• Settlement (Landnahme) by Christoph Hein, translated by Philip Boehm — shortlist
• The Believers by Zoë Heller — shortlist
• Netherland by Joseph O'Neill — shortlist
• God's Own Country by Ross Raisin — shortlist
• Home by Marilynne Robinson — shortlist

2009

• Man Gone Down by Michael Thomas — difficulty 68/100, about 15 hours
• The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Díaz — shortlist
• Ravel by Jean Echenoz, translated by Linda Coverdale — shortlist
• The Reluctant Fundamentalist by Mohsin Hamid — shortlist
• The Archivist's Story by Travis Holland — shortlist
• The Burnt-Out Town of Miracles (Hoggerne) by Roy Jacobsen, translated by Don Shaw and Don Bartlett — shortlist
• The Indian Clerk by David Leavitt — shortlist
• Animal's People by Indra Sinha — shortlist

2008

• De Niro's Game by Rawi Hage — difficulty 51/100, about 4.6 hours
• The Speed of Light (La velocidad de la luz) by Javier Cercas, translated by Anne McLean — shortlist
• The Sweet & Simple Kind by Yasmine Gooneratne — shortlist
• Dreams of Speaking by Gail Jones — shortlist
• Let It Be Morning (ויהי בוקר) by Sayed Kashua, translated by Miriam Shlesinger — shortlist
• The Attack (L'Attentat) by Yasmina Khadra, translated by John Cullen — shortlist
• The Woman Who Waited (La femme qui attendait) by Andreï Makine, translated by Geoffrey Strachan — shortlist
• Winterwood by Patrick McCabe — shortlist

2007

• Out Stealing Horses (Ut og stjæle hester) by Per Petterson, translated by Anne Born — difficulty 72/100, about 8.4 hours
• Arthur & George by Julian Barnes — shortlist
• A Long Long Way by Sebastian Barry — shortlist
• Slow Man by J. M. Coetzee — shortlist
• Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer — shortlist
• The Short Day Dying by Peter Hobbs — shortlist
• No Country for Old Men by Cormac McCarthy — shortlist
• Shalimar the Clown by Salman Rushdie — shortlist

2006

• The Master by Colm Tóibín — difficulty 57/100, about 6.7 hours
• GraceLand by Chris Abani — shortlist
• Maps for Lost Lovers by Nadeem Aslam — shortlist
• Havoc in Its Third Year by Ronan Bennett — shortlist
• The Closed Circle by Jonathan Coe — shortlist
• An Altered Light (Et andet lys) by Jens Christian Grøndahl, translated by Anne Born — shortlist
• The Swallows of Kabul (Les Hirondelles de Kaboul) by Yasmina Khadra, translated by John Cullen — shortlist
• Breaking the Tongue by Vyvyane Loh — shortlist
• Don't Move (Non ti muovere) by Margaret Mazzantini, translated by John Cullen — shortlist
• The Logogryph by Thomas Wharton — shortlist

2005

• The Known World by Edward P. Jones — difficulty 58/100, about 11 hours
• Gardening at Night by Diane Awerbuck — shortlist
• The Half Brother (Halvbroren) by Lars Saabye Christensen, translated by Kenneth Steven — shortlist
• The Good Doctor by Damon Galgut — shortlist
• Elle by Douglas Glover — shortlist
• Phantom Pain (Fantoompijn) by Arnon Grunberg, translated by Sam Garrett — shortlist
• The Great Fire by Shirley Hazzard — shortlist
• Willenbrock by Christoph Hein, translated by Philip Boehm — shortlist
• Deafening by Frances Itani — shortlist
• The Fortress of Solitude by Jonathan Lethem — shortlist

2004

• This Blinding Absence of Light (Cette aveuglante absence de lumière) by Tahar Ben Jelloun, translated by Linda Coverdale — difficulty 59/100, about 4 hours
• The Book of Illusions by Paul Auster — shortlist
• Any Human Heart by William Boyd — shortlist
• Caramelo by Sandra Cisneros — shortlist
• Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides — shortlist
• The White Family by Maggie Gee — shortlist
• Balthasar's Odyssey (Le Périple de Baldassare) by Amin Maalouf, translated by Barbara Bray — shortlist
• Family Matters by Rohinton Mistry — shortlist
• Earth and Ashes (خاکستر و خاک) by Atiq Rahimi, translated by Erdağ Göknar — shortlist
• House of Day, House of Night (Dom dzienny, dom nocny) by Olga Tokarczuk, translated by Antonia Lloyd-Jones — shortlist

2003

• My Name Is Red (Benim Adım Kırmızı) by Orhan Pamuk, translated by Erdağ Göknar — difficulty 63/100, about 16 hours
• The Ash Garden by Dennis Bock — shortlist
• Bitter Fruit by Achmat Dangor — shortlist
• The Visit of the Royal Physician (Livläkarens besök) by Per Olov Enquist, translated by Tiina Nunnally — shortlist
• The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen — shortlist
• The Migrant Painter of Birds (O Vale da Paixão) by Lídia Jorge, translated by Margaret Jull Costa — shortlist
• That They May Face the Rising Sun by John McGahern — shortlist
• Bel Canto by Ann Patchett — shortlist

2002

• Atomised (Les Particules élémentaires) by Michel Houellebecq, translated by Frank Wynne — difficulty 52/100, about 6.6 hours
• The Blind Assassin by Margaret Atwood — shortlist
• True History of the Kelly Gang by Peter Carey — shortlist
• The Keepers of Truth by Michael Collins — shortlist
• The Last Samurai by Helen DeWitt — shortlist
• The Years with Laura Diaz (Los años con Laura Díaz) by Carlos Fuentes, translated by Alfred MacAdam — shortlist
• Madame by Antoni Libera, translated by Agnieszka Kołakowska — shortlist

2001

• No Great Mischief by Alistair MacLeod — difficulty 54/100, about 5 hours
• The True History of Paradise by Margaret Cezair-Thompson — shortlist
• The Love You Promised Me (El amor que me juraste) by Silvia Molina, translated by David Unger — shortlist
• Our Fathers by Andrew O'Hagan — shortlist
• The Clay Machine-Gun (Чапаев и Пустота) by Victor Pelevin, translated by Andrew Bromfield — shortlist
• The Blackwater Lightship by Colm Tóibín — shortlist

2000

• Wide Open by Nicola Barker — difficulty 51/100, about 5 hours
• The Hours by Michael Cunningham — shortlist
• Trumpet by Jackie Kay — shortlist
• This Side of Brightness by Colum McCann — shortlist
• Charming Billy by Alice McDermott — shortlist
• Paradise by Toni Morrison — shortlist
• I Married a Communist by Philip Roth — shortlist

1999

• Ingenious Pain by Andrew Miller — difficulty 74/100, about 12 hours
• Quarantine by Jim Crace — shortlist
• Underworld by Don DeLillo — shortlist
• The Ordinary Seaman by Francisco Goldman — shortlist
• Enduring Love by Ian McEwan — shortlist
• The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle (ねじまき鳥クロニクル) by Haruki Murakami, translated by Jay Rubin — shortlist
• The Puttermesser Papers by Cynthia Ozick — shortlist
• The Reader (Der Vorleser) by Bernhard Schlink, translated by Carol Janeway — shortlist

1998

• The Land of Green Plums (Herztier) by Herta Müller, translated by Michael Hofmann — difficulty 58/100, about 5 hours
• Alias Grace by Margaret Atwood — shortlist
• Imaginings of Sand (Sandkastele) by André Brink, translated by André Brink — shortlist
• The Counting House by David Dabydeen — shortlist
• The Glade Within the Grove by David Foster — shortlist
• The Autobiography of My Mother by Jamaica Kincaid — shortlist
• Salt by Earl Lovelace — shortlist
• The Pope's Rhinoceros by Lawrence Norfolk — shortlist
• Last Orders by Graham Swift — shortlist
• The Englishman's Boy by Guy Vanderhaeghe — shortlist

1997

• A Heart So White (Corazón tan blanco) by Javier Marías, translated by Margaret Jull Costa — difficulty 52/100, about 7.5 hours
• Reservation Blues by Sherman Alexie — shortlist
• A Tiler's Afternoon (En kakelsättares eftermiddag) by Lars Gustafsson, translated by Tom Geddes — shortlist
• Novel Without a Name (Tiểu thuyết vô đề) by Dương Thu Hương, translated by Phan Huy Duong and Nina McPherson — shortlist
• A Fine Balance by Rohinton Mistry — shortlist
• Pereira Maintains (Sostiene Pereira) by Antonio Tabucchi, translated by Patrick Creagh — shortlist
• The Good Negress by A. J. Verdelle — shortlist
• Morvern Callar by Alan Warner — shortlist

1996

• Remembering Babylon by David Malouf — difficulty 61/100, about 5.2 hours
• Ghosts by John Banville — shortlist
• A Way in the World by V. S. Naipaul — shortlist
• The Following Story (Het volgende verhaal) by Cees Nooteboom, translated by Ina Rilke — shortlist
• The Laws (De wetten) by Connie Palmen, translated by Richard Huijing — shortlist
• The Gospel According to Jesus Christ (O Evangelho segundo Jesus Cristo) by José Saramago, translated by Giovanni Pontiero — shortlist
• Away by Jane Urquhart — shortlist

Questions

Who won the Dublin Literary Award in 2026?

Gliff by Ali Smith.

Which Dublin Literary Award winner should I read first?

For the gentlest start, Family Life by Akhil Sharma: the easiest of the 27 winners on ReadingRate to read, with a difficulty of 46/100 and about 3.6 hours of reading. For the quickest, The Adversary by Michael Crummey, about 2.8 hours.

Which Dublin Literary Award winner is the hardest to read?

Solar Bones by Mike McCormack, with a difficulty of 76/100; it takes about 11 hours.

How long would it take to read every Dublin Literary Award winner?

About 211 hours at an average reading pace, for the 27 winners with a measured length.

Winners from Wikipedia, checked 2026-10-31.

Other prizes: Nobel Prize in Literature, Booker Prize, Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, International Booker Prize, National Book Award for Fiction, Women's Prize for Fiction, Hugo Award for Best Novel, Nebula Award for Best Novel, Prix Goncourt, PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction, National Book Award for Nonfiction, Costa Novel Award, Albert J. Beveridge Award, Goodreads Choice Award for Fiction. Every literary prize; every winner of 2026.