Since 2022, a seven-member European jury is choosing an overall winner for each edition of EUPL, as well as five special mentions.
The European jury is composed of seven members: all literary experts, with professional influence and who are both competent and influential in the field of literature and translation.
The members of the European jury are appointed by the two members of the EUPL Consortium, after consultation with experts in the sector. They are now reading the translated extracts before they announce their decision on 28 April in Leipzig.
Meet the members of the European jury for #EUPL2023 :
Andrey Kourkov
Andrey Kurkov (born 23 April 1961 in Leningrad, Russia) is a Ukrainian novelist who writes in Russian. He is the author of more than 20 novels and 10 books for children. His work is currently translated into 42 languages. He has also written assorted articles for various publications worldwide.
For his novels, for literary and human rights activities he was awarded Halldor Laxness Prize (Iceland, 2022), “Légion d’Honneur” (France, 2015), Medici Prize for Best foreign Novel (France, 2022), “Freedom of Expression Award” (Index on Censorship, London, 2022), “Readers’ Award” (France, 2012), Hans and Sophie Scholl Prize (Germany, 2022) and others.
From 2018 till 2022 he was acting President of PEN Ukraine, running international and national literary and socio-political projects.
His books are full of black humour, Soviet and post-Soviet reality with elements of surrealism.
Henrik Francke
Henrik Francke (born 1972) has been an agent at Oslo Literary Agency since 2016. He graduated in social anthropology at the University of Oslo and has also worked as a bookseller, translator, and editor.
Imre Barna
Imre Barna is a writer, literary translator and editor born in Budapest in 1951. He received his university degree of Italian and German language and literature at ELTE, Budapest. He has been director at Európa Publishing House, director of the Hungarian Academy in Rome and chairman of the Hungarian Publishers and Booksellers Association. He writes essays, criticisms, proses and literary translations. He received the Wessely Prize (1989), József Attila Prize (2006) and the National Translator’s Prize of the Italian Government (Premio Nazionale per la Traduzione – 2005-2007). He was awarded the Knight Degree and Officer’s Cross of the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic (2003, 2018)
Koukla MacLehose
Koukla was born in Athens (Greece) after the war from French parents (her father was a military attaché at the French Embassy). She grew up in Greece, Germany, France and Italy.
She spent two years in North America after graduating in “Lettres Modernes” at the Sorbonne, working first at Expo 67 in Montreal (French Pavilion), then as an assistant teacher at the French Lycée in New York.
From 1970 to 1975 she worked for an American advertising agency in Paris: Ogilvy & Mather. From 1975 to 1985, she was the Foreign Rights Director for the publishing house Flammarion in Paris.
Koukla left to marry fellow publisher Christopher MacLehose (then running The Harvill Press) in London, where she became a literary scout in February 1987, starting with four foreign publishers. By the end of the century, they were working with publishers in fourteen countries. In 2016 she gave 80% of the agency to my two colleagues and went on scouting books written in French. She retired on the 31st of December 2022. The agency is now managed by Rebecca Servadio under the name of London Literary Scouting.
Sharon Galant
Sharon Galant has worked in publishing and the book industry for over 15 years. She started her career with Editions Complexe, an independent publisher based in Brussels specialised in literature, history and international relations. In 2004 she moved to China where she managed a major English-language bookstore chain (Charterhouse Bookstores). In her role as buyer and events organiser, she reviewed virtually every title published about China and met new and upcoming authors, both Chinese and long-standing expats. In 2009 she co-founded Zeitgeist Agency, an international literary agency with offices in Sydney and Brussels that represents authors from over 20 countries for book & screen rights. Her passion is to connect writers and publishers around the world.
Sharon is a fiction aficionado but has a soft spot for thought-provoking non-fiction. This stems from a previous career in international organisations (European Commission, CARE International) which brought her to live and work in different regions, including the Middle East, Africa & Eastern Europe.
Sharon holds a bachelor’s degree in Economics and did a Masters degree at the LSE in Politics of World Economy.
Sheila O’Reilly
Sheila has worked in the book industry for 30 years. Under her ownership, Dulwich Books was shortlisted in the British Book Awards Independent Bookshop of the year category in 2012, 2013 before winning the overall award in 2014. Sheila is now Project Manager for the Booksellers Association Learning platform and since 2015 has been an independent bookshop mentor for the Unwin Charitable Trust/Bookseller Association scheme. She is a member of the Bookselling Ireland committee. In 2023 Sheila is a judge for the retail category of the British Book Awards.
Svetlozar Zhelev
Svetlozar Zhelev is the director of the National Book Center at the National Palace of Culture in Sofia, Bulgaria. He holds a MA in history from Sofia University and a Diploma on Corporate management from Open University, London. He teaches “Book publishing” at Master program of Sofia University for more than 10 years. As an independent literary consultant, literary agent, professional reader and blogger, he is involved in a huge number of projects.
Svetlozar Zhelev has worked in publishing since 1998. He used to be the publishing director of Ciela Publishing house from 2004 to 2012, marketing director of Colibri Publishers 2013 - 2014, the founder, first publisher and editor-in-chief of GRANTA Bulgaria. Member of the Board of Bulgarian Book Association from 2006 to 2010, co-founder of “Elizabeth Kostova Foundation on creative writing” and Board member from 2007 to 2021, President of the Jury of the Program “Translations” of the Bulgarian National Fund Culture 2019-2021.
As a member of the Jury he is involved through the years in European Union Prize for Literature 2021, “Novel of the Year” Prize 2019, 2020, 2021, “Helikon” Prize, “Askeer” Prize for playwriting, “Cultural Calendar” and Program “Literature” of the Sofia Municipality, and many others.
Svetlozar Zhelev is the editor and author of 5 books. The last one, “Love for Advanced”, is a two-volume collection of texts of 88 contemporary Bulgarian poets and writers.
