Adil Babikir

Babikir graduated from the Faculty of Arts, University of Khartoum, and also holds an M.A. in Translation from the Faculty of Languages, Sudan University of Science and Technology. Babikir was employed by the state-run Sudan News Agency (SUNA), in its English news desk. Later, he moved to Saudi Arabia and worked for several companies in business and general translation. Next, he joined the US Embassy in Riyadh as information officer for more than ten years. He then moved to the United Arab Emirates, working in translation and business promotion for several companies.[1]

Babikir's translations to English have appeared in Africa World Press, Banipal, Al-Dawha Magazine, and others. His published translations include The Jungo: Stakes of the Earth and The Messiah of Darfur, excerpted in the Los Angeles Review of Books, by Abdel Aziz Baraka Sakin, and Mansi: A Rare Man on his Own Way by Sudanese writerTayeb Salih. For the latter, he received the 2020 Sheikh Hamad Translation Award.[2] Further, Babikir also translated Summer Maize (2017), a collection of short stories by Sudanese-British writer Leila Aboulela, from English to Arabic.[3]

Babikir is the editor and translator of the anthology Modern Sudanese Poetry, published in 2019, and translated the texts of Literary Sudans: An anthology of literature from Sudan and South Sudan.[4] His study The Beauty Hunters: Sudanese Bedouin Poetry, Evolution and Impact, described as complementing works on Sudan’s cultural identity was published in 2023 by University of Nebraska Press.[5] On this occasion, the literary magazine ArabLit published part of the book's first chapter, with excerpts about Sudanese writer Al-Ḥārdallo’s life and poems.[6]

Among his works of literary criticism, Babikir published an essay in 2013, two years after the independence of South Sudan, about South Sudanese writer Mongo Zambeiri on the conflict between politics and culture.[7] In 2021, he received the Africa Institute's Global Africa Translation Fellowship.[1][8] Babikir has contributed several translations to literary magazines such as Banipal[3] and ArabLit & ArabLit Quarterly.[9]

• Sudanese literature
• List of Sudanese writers

• Babikir, Adil (ed.) (2019). Modern Sudanese Poetry: An Anthology. Lincoln, NE, USA. ISBN 978-1-4962-1563-5
• Babikir, Adil (2023). The Beauty Hunters. Sudanese Bedouin Poetry, Evolution and Impact. Lincoln, NE, USA. ISBN 978-1-4962-3409-4
• Shringarpure, Bhakti; Liyong, Taban lo; Babikir, Adil (2016). Literary Sudans: an anthology of literature from Sudan and South Sudan. Trenton, New Jersey. ISBN 978-1-56902-434-8. OCLC 958449678.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)

• Official webpage
• Sudanese literature available in English
• Poem Three Songs for the Ghajar, by Mughira Harbya, translated by Adil Babikir