Sharing the Dagger, Author and Translator
After winning the 2025 CWA Dagger for Crime Fiction in Translation for my English version of The Night of Baba Yaga by Akira Otani, I spoke with TBS (Japan) about my views on translation and what winning this prize could mean for Japanese literature.
2025.07.03
Processing: How Sam Bett Translated Osamu Dazai
Discussed translating comedy with Lincoln Michel for Counter Craft
2025.02.18
Voices of the Fallen Heroes
by Yukio Mishima
Vintage International
2025.01
translated "The Dragon Flute," the last short story Yukio Mishima wrote before his death in 1970.
The Door Between Us
by Mieko Kawakami
The New Yorker
2024.08
translated story for summer "Flash Fiction" series
The Night of Baba Yaga
by Akira Otani
Soho Crime (US) 2024.07
Faber & Faber (UK) 2024.09
2025 CWA Dagger for Crime Fiction in Translation, winner
2025 CrimeFest Specsavers Debut Crime Novel Award, winner
2025 37th Lambda Literary Awards, LGBTQ+ Mystery, shortlist
Hit Parade of Tears
by Izumi Suzuki
Verso Books
2023.04
translated stories “Trial Witch” and “My Guy”
2023 British Science Fiction Association Award for Best Translated Short Fiction, shortlist
The Flowers of Buffoonery
by Osamu Dazai
New Directions
2023.03
2024 Great Britain Sasakawa Foundation Translation Prize, shortlist
Queer Subjects in Modern Japanese Literature
University of Michigan Press
2022.12
translated story “Worse for Love” by Sakakiyama Tamotsu (Yukio Mishima)
All the Lovers in the Night
by Mieko Kawakami
Europa Editions (US) 2022.05
Picador (UK) 2022.05
cotranslated with David Boyd
2022 National Book Critics Circle Award for Fiction, finalist
2023 Great Britain Sasakawa Foundation Translation Prize, runner-up
Breasts and Eggs
by Mieko Kawakami
Europa Editions (US) 2020.04
Picador (UK) 2020.08
cotranslated with David Boyd
2021 Warwick Prize for Women in Translation, shortlist
Katanagatari
by NISIOISIN
Kodansha
2018 to 2020
Four omnibus editions comprising NISIOISIN’s complete twelve-volume Katanagatari “Sword Tale” light novel saga, illuminated by footnotes written by Sam Bett for the translation