The Winners and the Books: The 2025 Sapir Prize for Literature in Memory of Pinchas Sapir

The 25th-anniversary celebrations of the founding of the Mifal HaPayis Sapir Prize and the ceremony to select the 2025 prize winner took place last night (Monday, Feb 2). The event was held as a special evening titled "Between the Lines," dedicated entirely to the love and celebration of Hebrew literature. To mark a quarter-century since the prize's inception, a multi-faceted event was held at the National Library in Jerusalem, the home of the written word.

The ceremony, hosted by singer and actress Esther Rada, was attended by: Chairman of the Board of Mifal HaPayis - Itzik Larry, CEO of Mifal HaPayis - Adv. Benyamin Dreyfus, Chairperson of the Judging Committee - Dr. Ruth Calderon, and featured: past winners—Sapir Prize laureates through the generations—the excited nominees and their families, special guests, and other invitees.

As part of the evening's artistic program, The Kadosh Brothers—a unique ensemble of three musical brothers—brought a distinctive sound experience to the stage, blending jazz, classical Arabic music, and progressive rock. The Kadosh Brothers performed the songs "JIRJUR" and "Shir Shel Yom Hulin" (A Weekday Song), while singer Esther Rada performed the song "Od Nipagesh" (We Will Meet Again).

The event began with a wandering experience throughout the library, featuring an original literary-performance work written specifically for the event. This performance integrated texts from winning works over the years, alongside tours of library exhibitions and displays of original and rare manuscripts penned by the giants of Hebrew literature held in the library's collections: S.Y. Agnon, Leah Goldberg, Uri Zvi Greenberg, Amos Oz, A.B. Yehoshua, and others. Guests were invited to roam, experience, and curate the sequence of events that suited them, in an evening that revealed the materials from which literature is composed.

Mifal HaPayis announced the winners of the 2025 Sapir Prize for Literature last night (Monday, Feb 2):

The Mifal HaPayis Sapir Prize for Literature, named after Pinchas Sapir, was founded in 2000 to encourage quality Hebrew literary creation and reading culture in Israel, and is being awarded for the 25th year. The Sapir Prize is the most generous, prestigious, esteemed, and famous literary prize awarded in Israel, presented for 25 years by Mifal HaPayis. The prize is awarded annually to the best literary works of the past year in a main track and a debut track.

The winners of the Sapir Prize and the Debut Prize were chosen by the judging committee led by Chairperson Dr. Ruth Calderon, President of "Alma," a Home for Hebrew Culture and a faculty member at the Mandel Center for Leadership, together with the committee members (listed alphabetically by surname): Tslil Abraham - journalist and podcast creator, literary critic at "Haaretz," and co-host of the culture program "Yom-Yom" on Kan Tarbut. Nadav Halperin - poet, journalist, and host of the program "Esh Zara." Dr. Orit Meital - Director of the Agnon House, poet, lecturer, and editor. Tal Nitzan - poet, author, translator, and editor. Dr. Lilach Netanel - author and researcher of Hebrew and Yiddish literature. Associate Professor (Emeritus) Hannah Shveger-Soker - lecturer at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev (Emeritus), editor of "Mikan," a journal for the study of Jewish and Israeli literature and culture.

The grand prize for the Sapir Prize for Literature was presented by the Chairman of the Board of Mifal HaPayis, Itzik Larry. The winner of the "2025 Mifal HaPayis Sapir Prize for Literature" will receive a grant of 180,000 NIS, and their book will be translated and published in Arabic and another foreign language of their choice. Additionally, Mifal HaPayis will purchase a 500-copy edition of the books by the five authors selected for the "Shortlist" and the "Debut Book" category, donating them as gifts to public libraries across the country.

The Debut Track prize was presented by the Chairperson of the Judging Committee, Dr. Ruth Calderon, President of "Alma" and faculty member at the Mandel Center for Leadership. The winner of the "Debut Prize" track will receive a cash prize of 75,000 NIS.

Chairman of the Board of Mifal HaPayis, Itzik Larry, congratulated the winners, saying: "The Mifal HaPayis Sapir Prize for Literature is the showcase of Israeli literature, expressing our deep commitment to strengthening Hebrew creation and promoting diverse and high-quality literary voices. This year’s winners join a distinguished line of creators who shape the face of Israeli literature and give it depth, meaning, and hope."

Chairperson of the Judging Committee, Dr. Ruth Calderon: "In recent months, together with an excellent selection committee, we met talented, moving, and committed authors through the pages. These authors sat during the difficult past years, amidst the sorrow and horror of war, and dedicated their time and the essence of their being to listening to the bustling reality around us and writing new, original work. Authors are the ghost-workers of culture, repairing with words the cracks formed in the Israeli soul. There is no place more suitable to celebrate the annual harvest of books than here, in the new National Library building, the home of the written word. Many thanks to Mifal HaPayis for their multi-year commitment to supporting Israeli culture and literature, and for the significant investment that enables the promotion of quality Hebrew creation and a rich, diverse culture."

Reasons for the selection of the book "Breakdown, Bereavement, and Zombies" by Amir Hirsh / published by Am Oved:

If there is a piercing debate in Israel today about love (and hate) and about freedom, then this book is as much freedom as literature can provide. It hides love within it because it reminds us of life and the value of life. Sometimes, in fire and tears, in destruction, bereavement, and failure, one can contemplate life only from its other side—the side of death. This book invites us to contemplate the future, the one that must necessarily come, after death and after all the wars.

"Breakdown, Bereavement, and Zombies" by Amir Hirsh brings back to life the Land of Israel novel by author Yosef Haim Brenner, who was murdered in Jaffa during the events of May 1921. Year zero of the Jewish-Arab conflict returns in this book and rolls into the Israel of 2025. One does not need to know Brenner's work to read this book: one only needs to live here to understand it, to feel sorrow because of it, and also to laugh at it—albeit a laughter of shock.

Amir Hirsh is a brilliant reader of Hebrew literature, knowing the soul of Israeli culture and restoring its spirit. He draws Brenner by his tongue to describe precisely the exposed nerve of so many Israelis in these days and at this time: "It is possible, very possible, that one cannot live here, but here one must stay, here one must die, sleep, there is no other place..."

For an imagination that holds a grain of truth, for an awe-inspiring act of literary delivery, for a historical novel that insists on asking about the future to come in this land, for the magnificent dance on the rope stretched between the living and the dead, before our time and long after us—this book is a work of creation in every sense of the word.

Reasons for the selection of the debut book "Sitara" by Roni Parciack / published by Gama-Tangier:

With breathtaking writing, "Sitara" weaves plots set against the backdrop of the state of emergency in 1970s India, including the suspension of civil rights, the ban on protests, and a mass sterilization program. Far from the "here and now" so common in Hebrew literature, in the world of Muslim men in India, a whirlpool occurs that swirls the fibers of the body and consciousness, alongside alleys, dark spaces, and political and religious struggles. All the arteries pulse in this novel that invites us to be drawn into a far and alien world, held by its cruel and sensual beauty.

The book is woven before our eyes through voices and sights set like glass shards in the Sitara fabrics: "I hear the rustle of leaves, the swirling dust motes. I hear the small bones popping in your slight, crouching body, curled like a fetus, the thin blood passing through your veins, the skin cells tensed until they crack. Something in the internal course of your heartbeats goes wrong and jars. What happened, what was breached in you somewhere in time?". This question does not let go of the narrator who opens the book, or the readers, until the final moment and beyond, in an attempt to understand "what was breached."

The Mifal HaPayis Sapir Prize for Literature: Founded in 2000 to encourage quality Hebrew literary creation and reading culture in Israel, it is being awarded for the 25th year.

The following is the list of winners over the years:

2000: Haim Sabato, "Adjusting Sights," Yedioth Ahronoth

2001: David Grossman, "Someone to Run With," HaKibbutz HaMeuchad

2002: Gail Hareven, "The Confessions of Noa Weber," Keter Books

2003: The late Amir Gutfreund, "Our Holocaust," Kinneret Zmora-Bitan Dvir

2004: The late Dan Tsalka, "Tsalka's ABC," Hargol

2005: Alona Frankel, "Girl," Mappa

2006: Ron Leshem, "Beaufort" (originally "If There is a Heaven"), Kinneret Zmora-Bitan Dvir

2007: Sara Shilo, "The Falafel King is Dead" (originally "No Dwarfs Will Come"), Am Oved

2008: The late Zvi Yanai, "Yours, Sandro," Keter

2010: The late Yoram Kaniuk, "1948," Yedioth Books

2011: Hagai Linik, "Prompter Wanted," The New Library, HaKibbutz HaMeuchad

2012: Shimon Adaf, "Mox Nox," Kinneret Zmora-Bitan Dvir

2013: Noa Yedlin, "House Grounded," Kinneret Zmora-Bitan Dvir

2014: Reuven Namdar, "The Ruined House," Kinneret Zmora-Bitan Dvir

2015: Orly Castel-Bloom, "An Egyptian Novel," The New Library, HaKibbutz HaMeuchad/Siman Kriah Books

2016: Michal Ben-Naftali, "The Teacher," Keter Books

2017: Esther Peled, "Widely Open from Below," Babel

2018: Etgar Keret, "Fly Already!" (originally "Fault at the Edge of the Galaxy"), Kinneret Zmora Dvir

2019: Ilana Bernstein, "Tomorrow We'll Go to the Amusement Park," Kinneret Zmora-Bitan Dvir

2020: Sami Berdugo, "Donkey," The New Library

2021: Hila Blum, "How to Love Your Daughter," Kinneret Zmora Dvir

2022: Orit Ilan, "Sister to the Pleiades," Yedioth Books

2023: Ofra Offer Oren, "What Happened to Hagar in Eilat," Kinneret Zmora-Bitan

2024: Yossi Avni-Levy, "Three Days in Summer," Kinneret Zmora-Bitan