Sigbjørn Skåden won the 2026 Nordic Council Literature Prize for Láŋtdievvá / Planterhaug. The award was announced on 20 October and presented in Helsinki on 27 October. It was the first award for a Sámi-language work since Nils-Aslak Valkeapää’s Beaivi, Áhčážan in 1991. This guide introduces the novel through the jury’s account and points to two books available in English.
A prize for a book with more than one language
The novel appeared in 2025 in parallel Sámi and Norwegian editions. Both the Sámi-language and Norwegian juries nominated it, a remarkable feature of this year’s selection. In the Norwegian text, Skåden moves among Torne Sámi, Nynorsk and Bokmål. Nynorsk and Bokmål are two written standards of Norwegian; Torne Sámi belongs to the Sámi language family. These changes are not merely local colour. The prize jury explains that language marks belonging, distance and power among the characters.
Its premise resembles a detective story: investigator John Edgar Huuva returns to his home village to examine a death. But the people he meets are not easily deciphered, and the investigation draws him towards histories of Norwegianisation. That term describes policies and pressures through which Sámi people were expected to adopt majority Norwegian language and identity. The High North News account, published on 21 October, describes the unsettling atmosphere and the juries’ attention to language, folklore and history.
In her report for High North News, Astri Edvardsen describes how Huuva is met with silence and evasive answers on his return. The Nordic Council jury’s rationale connects the investigation with the history of Norwegianisation and questions of Sámi identity in present-day Norway.
Sápmi and the language of the novel
Sápmi is the Sámi homeland. It extends across parts of Norway, Sweden, Finland and Russia. Skåden writes in both Sámi and Norwegian, and the two editions offer readers different language versions of the novel.
The prize jury identifies simultaneous Sámi and Norwegian editions. The books below are separately documented English translations for readers who want to explore Sámi fiction or nonfiction.
Two different ways into the literature
The following publisher pages identify two English-language editions of work by Sámi writers. One is a novel and the other is historical nonfiction.
Ann-Helén Laestadius’s Stolen follows Elsa, a girl from a Sámi reindeer-herding family in Sweden who witnesses the killing of a reindeer. In her review for The Guardian, Suzi Feay calls attention to the title: the police classify the attacks as theft, while the herders experience them as a threat to their way of life. Rachel Willson-Broyles translated the novel from Swedish. The Scribner edition page gives the paperback details.
Elin Anna Labba’s The Rocks Will Echo Our Sorrow: The Forced Displacement of the Northern Sámi is nonfiction based on testimony and historical documents about the forced displacement of Sámi reindeer-herding families. Fiona Graham translated the book from Swedish. The University of Minnesota Press edition page gives the publication details.
What to notice when you read
For a reading group, compare the publisher’s account with Feay’s review of Stolen. Which details does the reviewer use to explain the title? When reading Labba, note which passages draw on testimony and which introduce other historical sources.
For more on reading across languages, see Litteraturnet’s Danish guide to writers in translation and the English guide to Solvej Balle.
See also our Danish report on the award for Láŋtdievvá / Planterhaug.
Sources and further reading
Nordic Council: 2026 prize announcement (20 October 2026); Nordic Council: jury rationale for Skåden; High North News: Sámi prize report (21 October 2026); Scribner: Stolen edition; University of Minnesota Press: The Rocks Will Echo Our Sorrow.
Criticism and further reading
Suzi Feay, Stolen by Ann-Helén Laestadius review – the reindeer murders, The Guardian, 16 February 2023 (English). Astri Edvardsen’s report on the award, High North News, 21 October 2026 (English), provides the publication context.
Photo: Jon Harald Søby / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0; the Commons image was cropped from the photographer’s original. The embedded orientation was applied and the file was resized for web display.
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