Henar Press

We're an independent, 501(c)(3) nonprofit press based in Columbus, Ohio, dedicated to bringing experimental Kurdish writing to the world. Our books span fiction, poetry, and creative nonfiction from both emerging and established writers from the homeland and diaspora.

In the face of ongoing genocide and ethnic cleansing, we believe in the power of literature to resist erasure and reclaim our narrative. As a Kurdish-owned and operated press, we champion historically overlooked voices and innovative works that complicate the supposed Kurdish question.

Censorship within Kurdistan and abroad has stifled radical expression for generations. Our mission is to publish prose and poetry that speaks its own truth free from the colonial gaze. We aim to disentangle Kurdish literature from its reductive portrayal as stateless and nationless and foster a deeper awareness of its stories, art, and culture.

Contribute

Every donation, big or small, makes a difference in our mission to share Kurdish literature with readers everywhere. Since we're a 501(c)(3) nonprofit, every dollar you contribute is 100% tax-deductible. Please consider donating to keep us going.

If you're looking for other ways to support our authors, translators, and organization, consider purchasing our books, requesting them at your library, or lending a hand as a volunteer.

Writers are welcome to submit their manuscripts through our contact form. We welcome prose and poetry in any language. If you're interested in reading more Kurdish writing, check out our continuously evolving database of Kurdish literature in translation.

People

Arian Sorani

Publisher & Editor-in-Chief

Arian Sorani is the founder and editor-in-chief of Henar Press, a nonprofit organization dedicated to publishing experimental Kurdish writing and maintaining the Kurdish literary database. A former neuroimaging fellow at the Institute for Social Research, he divides his time between Columbus and Abu Dhabi.

Tracy Fuad

Board President

Tracy Fuad's second book of poetry, PORTAL (University of Chicago, 2024) won the 2023 Phoenix Emerging Poets Prize. A 2023 National Endowment for the Arts Fellow, Fuad's poems have appeared in The Paris Review, The Yale Review and The New Republic and have been translated into Kurdish, Turkish, German, and Spanish.

Holly Mason Badra

Board Vice President

Holly Mason Badra is a Kurdish-American writer. Her poetry, essays, reviews, and interviews appear in Meridian, The Arkansas International, The Rumpus, CALYX, Circumference, Asymptote, and elsewhere. She is currently the associate director of Women and Gender Studies at George Mason University.

Chad W. Post

Board Secretary

Chad W. Post is the director of Open Letter Books, a press at the University of Rochester dedicated to publishing contemporary literature from around the world. He is also the author of The Three Percent Problem: Rants and Responses on Publishing, Translation, and the Future of Reading.

Gary Lovely

Board Treasurer

Gary Lovely is co-owner of the bookstore Two Dollar Radio HQ and the founder of Harpoon Books, an indie publishing company based in Columbus, Ohio. Gary has been working in books for nearly 16 years across 5 bookstores and 2 publishing houses.

Shene Mohammed

Board Outreach & Translation Officer

Shene Mohammed is a translator at the Kurdistan Center for Arts and Culture. She is translating the autobiography of the renowned poet Hazhar Mukriyani, along with Kurdish folktales and poems. She graduated with a Literary Translation MFA from the University of Iowa.

Hannah Fox

Literary Database Archivist

Hannah Fox is a PhD candidate at the University of Leeds, UK, funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council. Her research focuses on literary representations of bibliomigrancy and censorship in twenty-first century world literature.

Contact Us

We'd love to hear from you, whether you have questions about our books, database, or submission process, are interested in volunteering, or if you just want to say hello!

We publish a wide range of genres, including novels, novellas, short story collections, poetry, memoirs, plays, chapbooks, and hybrid forms.
If you're submitting a work in translation, please include the manuscript in its original language.
Include a brief author bio, translator bio (if applicable), and synopsis.
Manuscripts can be in either Word or PDF format. Please limit file sizes to 5 MB.
We read and respond to every submission.