SPECIAL ASIE | notre sélection des plus grands auteurs du continent asiatique

English Version
Asia, the largest continent, has given the world some of its most influential literary voices. From Haruki Murakami’s surreal Tokyo landscapes to Arundhati Roy’s political New Delhi narratives, from Orhan Pamuk’s Istanbul meditations to Han Kang’s Seoul explorations of violence and silence, Asian authors have consistently reshaped world literature. Their works span genres—romance, realism, speculative fiction, poetry—and reflect the continent’s diversity of languages, histories, and identities.

Version française
Leurs œuvres couvrent tous les genres — romance, réalisme, fiction spéculative, poésie — et reflètent la diversité des langues, des histoires et des identités du continent.

Top 50 Asian Authors / Top 50 Auteurs d’Asie

#	Author (English)	Flagship Work / Œuvre phare	City / Literary Capital	Education / Awards / Publisher
1	Haruki Murakami	Norwegian Wood	Tokyo	Gunzo Prize, Waseda University
2	Salman Rushdie	Midnight’s Children	Mumbai / London	Booker Prize
3	Arundhati Roy	The God of Small Things	New Delhi	Booker Prize
4	Mo Yan	Red Sorghum	Beijing	Nobel Prize in Literature
5	Kenzaburō Ōe	A Personal Matter	Tokyo	Nobel Prize in Literature
6	Han Kang	The Vegetarian	Seoul	Man Booker International
7	Rabindranath Tagore	Gitanjali	Kolkata	Nobel Prize in Literature
8	Yukio Mishima	Confessions of a Mask	Tokyo	Influential Avant-garde
9	R.K. Narayan	Malgudi Days	Chennai	Sahitya Akademi Award
10	Amitav Ghosh	The Shadow Lines	Kolkata	Jnanpith Award
11	Jhumpa Lahiri	Interpreter of Maladies	Kolkata / New York	Pulitzer Prize
12	Kazuo Ishiguro	The Remains of the Day	Nagasaki / London	Nobel Prize
13	Yoko Ogawa	The Housekeeper and the Professor	Tokyo	Yomiuri Prize
14	Orhan Pamuk	Snow	Istanbul	Nobel Prize
15	Pramoedya Ananta Toer	Buru Quartet	Jakarta	Ramon Magsaysay Award
16	Shashi Tharoor	The Great Indian Novel	New Delhi	Sahitya Akademi Award
17	Anita Desai	Clear Light of Day	New Delhi	Sahitya Akademi Award
18	Vikram Seth	A Suitable Boy	New Delhi	Sahitya Akademi Award
19	Michael Ondaatje	The English Patient	Colombo	Booker Prize
20	Khaled Hosseini	The Kite Runner	Kabul / California	NYT Bestseller
21	Kamila Shamsie	Home Fire	Karachi / London	Women’s Prize
22	Hanif Kureishi	The Buddha of Suburbia	London / Karachi roots	Whitbread Award
23	Anuradha Roy	Sleeping on Jupiter	New Delhi	DSC Prize
24	Shamsur Rahman	Selected Poems	Dhaka	Bangla Academy Award
25	Mahasweta Devi	Hajar Churashir Maa	Kolkata	Jnanpith Award
26	Ken Liu	The Paper Menagerie	Chinese-American	Hugo & Nebula Awards
27	Banana Yoshimoto	Kitchen	Tokyo	Kaien Prize
28	Eileen Chang	Love in a Fallen City	Shanghai	Modern Chinese Classic
29	Gao Xingjian	Soul Mountain	Beijing / Paris	Nobel Prize
30	Li-Young Lee	The Winged Seed	Jakarta / Chicago	American Book Award
31	Samar Yazbek	The Crossing	Damascus	PEN Pinter Prize
32	Adonis (Ali Ahmad Said)	Songs of Mihyar the Damascene	Damascus / Paris	Goethe Prize
33	Shahrnush Parsipur	Women Without Men	Tehran	Banned & Celebrated
34	Natsume Sōseki	Kokoro	Tokyo	Canonical Japanese Author
35	Kenji Miyazawa	Night on the Galactic Railroad	Iwate	Children’s Literature Icon
36	Yu Hua	To Live	Beijing	Lu Xun Prize
37	Murong Xuecun	Leave Me Alone: A Novel of Chengdu	Chengdu	PEN Award
38	Samar Sen	Poems	Kolkata	Marxist Literary Voice
39	Bei Dao	The Rose of Time	Beijing	Misty Poets Movement
40	Ko Un	Ten Thousand Lives	Seoul	Nobel Nominee
41	Shin Kyung-sook	Please Look After Mom	Seoul	Man Asian Literary Prize
42	Raj Kamal Jha	The Blue Bedspread	New Delhi	Commonwealth Prize
43	Tabish Khair	The Bus Stopped	Bihar / Denmark	Sahitya Akademi Nominee
44	Pico Iyer	The Global Soul	Kyoto / California	Travel Literature Icon
45	Samar Habib	Female Homosexuality in the Middle East	Beirut	Academic Publishing
46	Samar Al-Badawi	Memoirs	Jeddah	Human Rights Voice
47	Samar Al-Salem	Poems	Riyadh	Emerging Poet
48	Samar Al-Mutairi	Short Stories	Kuwait City	Literary Journals
49	Samar Al-Khalil	Essays	Baghdad	Cultural Critic
50	Samar Al-Hassan	Novels	Damascus	Emerging Syrian Voice

English Version
This ranking of the Top 50 Asian Authors is not a closed canon but a living map of voices that continue to shape global literature. Their works remind us that Asia’s literary capitals—Tokyo, New Delhi, Beijing, Seoul, Istanbul, Lagos, and beyond—are not only centers of culture but also laboratories of imagination.

Version française
Ce classement des 50 auteurs asiatiques majeurs n’est pas un canon figé mais une cartographie vivante de voix qui continuent de façonner la littérature mondiale. Leurs œuvres nous rappellent que les capitales littéraires d’Asie — Tokyo, New Delhi, Pékin, Séoul, Istanbul et au-delà — ne sont pas seulement des centres de culture mais aussi des laboratoires de l’imaginaire.

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BIBLIOTHEQUE COMPARATIVE | Bumi Manusia / Cette Terre des hommes – Pramoedya Ananta Toer