Writer and Japanese Translator

Translated Novels

Featured

The Beggar Student

by Osamu Dazai
New Directions
2024.12

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

The Rope Artist

by Fuminori Nakamura
Soho Crime
2023.05

The Flowers of Buffoonery

by Osamu Dazai
New Directions
2023.03

2024 Great Britain Sasakawa Foundation Translation Prize, shortlist

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

My Annihilation

by Fuminori Nakamura
Soho Crime
2022.01

an NPR Best Book of 2022

Heaven

by Mieko Kawakami
Europa Editions (US) 2021.05
Picador (UK) 2021.06

cotranslated with David Boyd

2022 International Booker Prize, shortlist

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

Star

by Yukio Mishima
New Directions
2019.04

2019-2020 Japan-US Friendship Commission Prize for the Translation of Japanese Literature, winner

2019 Believer Book Award: Fiction, longlist

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

Translated Stories

Featured

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

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

Queer Subjects in Modern Japanese Literature

University of Michigan Press
2022.12

translated story “Worse for Love” by Sakakiyama Tamotsu (Yukio Mishima)

Terminal Boredom

by Izumi Suzuki
Verso Books
2021.04

translated story “Night Picnic”

Interviews

Featured

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

Finding a Voice for Japanese Literature

NHK Direct Talk

2024.12.19

ABOUT SAM

Sam Bett is a fiction writer and Japanese translator whose work has appeared in The New Yorker, Freeman's and The New York Times. A winner of the Japan–U.S. Friendship Commission Prize, he has translated fiction by Osamu Dazai, Izumi Suzuki, Fuminori Nakamura, Yoko Ogawa, and Yukio Mishima. Working with David Boyd, he cotranslated the Mieko Kawakami novels Heaven, shortlisted for the International Booker Prize; All the Lovers in the Night, a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award for Fiction; and Breasts and Eggs. As the translator of The Night of Baba Yaga by Akira Otani, he was awarded a CWA Dagger for Crime Fiction in Translation. Sam holds an MFA in Fiction from Bennington. His first novel is a romantic comedy set during the weekend of a shark fishing tournament in 1990s Martha’s Vineyard.

Author photo by Danny Gugger