The inaugural Hyphen Connects Contest invites students from universities across India to write a personal essay on the experience of choosing and reading a book translated from an Indian language.

You can write about a book that you have read already, or choose to read a book you have not yet read, for the purpose of this essay. This book may be from your personal to-read collection, from a friend’s or faculty’s library, from your institutional library, from a bookstore; you may also take recommendations from others as part of this search. Books translated not only to English, but to other Indian languages are also welcome. However, your personal essay submission must be written in English.

The essay can cover various themes. What was the book about? Did you know it was a translation when you picked it up? When did you find out, and did it change the experience? How was the experience of reading this book? How did it speak to you? You could include details of how you came to the book as well in your essay, in case it feels relevant.

Submission Guidelines:

The essay should be written in English, and must not exceed 500 words. Send your submissions to us by filling out the form below.

Please attach your essays to the form as a downloadable Word document only. The file should be named in the following format: YourName_HyphenConnectsContest

The deadline for submissions is 7th September, 2026.

Winning entries receive free subscriptions to Hyphen, and may also be featured on our Hyphen Connects webpage.

The Hyphen Connects Contest