The Hans Christian Andersen Award organization has avowed to honour the artistry and creative prowess of writers and illustrators ever since 1960s. Every two years, a number of major contributors, of the sort, to young children’s World of Literature are nominated and after a certain juried procedure, a few are taken down in the shortlist— prior to the selection of final winners1. The Euro-American trend of the Award’s winners was broken however, as from around 1970s when the Iranian institute of The Intellectual Development of Children and Young Adults recognized Farshid Mesghali’s impact. He was the first winner to be finalized from Asia— and, by extension, from Iran.
Mesghali: The First Iranian Pioneer to Win the Award
Though an Isfahanian, Mesghali studied arts at Tehran University before delving into illustration. Had he not participated in the Intellectual Development institute, done the graphic designing of books and films for children and youngsters, perhaps his potential wouldn’t have been officially recognized as to win the groundbreaking award. His professional touch in animation plays a decisive role in earning him an ever increasing pioneering popularity from around 1970 to 1978, as he was a skilled man in whisking Iranian cultural elements with modern techniques in production.2
‘It must be admitted,’ Mesghali had professed, explaining in his restless account of industry, ‘modern art in Iran has not progressed as it has in the West.’ Resuming his place, he’d addressed, ‘modern art in Iran… has not been the result of profound social and political changes’.3
No more had Mesghali presented the universality of his thematic and visual language than as his illustrations in the story of The Little Black Fish, in 1974, offered to the worldwide audience. The respectability of his work was then secured in later publications, namely The Boy with Blue Eyes and The Little Lizard in My Room.
Houshang Moradi Kermani, Acclaimed Iranian Author of the 2014 Edition
Houshang Moradi Kermani is probably the one nominated Iranian writer who, in particular, stands head and shoulders above his (Iranian) colleagues. That’s because he’s so exceptionally got close to winning the final award. . He majored in English Translation from the University of Tehran. Kermani’s fame could originally be attributed to the scripts he wrote for the radio— of a young boy who had his head clouded by the love of literature. The Stories of Majid did easily, at the time, secure for itself a seat of public exuberance as its ambiance, commonly speaking, was devoid of politics. It majorly displayed the normal day-to-day life of the living and heavily relied on conversational speech, as did many of the other stories by Kermani including The Palm Tree and A Sweet Jam in 1988.4
What fuels one, as an instance, to become the author of such a work as The Palm Tree, Kermani says, is “anyone who reads a book, due to their way of interpreting and mentally visualizing the story,… in a sense,” because then they become “like a spring that gushes forth from the heart of pure beliefs and religious memories, myths, ceremonies, and traditions…”. His unassailable resumé finally acquired him the highest recognition possible for a writer of the children’s world. The recognition that his prolific status had acquired enrolled him into the list of 2014 Andersen Award nominees— though the jury in the end decided that the award was better to be preserved for his Japanese competitor.5
Iranian Nominees of the Forthcoming 2026 Edition
Over the years, many Iranian writers and illustrators have been nominated for this prestigious award, and some of them more than once succeeded in reaching the shortlist, among which are writers such as Jamshid Khanian, Farhad Hassanzadeh, and illustrators like Hoda Haddadi, Farshird Shafiee and Pejman Rahimzadeh. For the forthcoming edition, , author Ahmad Akbarpour and illustrator Alireza Goldouzian are chosen as the Iranian nominees of the 2026 Andersen Award.
Ahmad Akbarpour: Faithful to his goal and subject, he completed studying Children’s Literature at Shiraz University. Earlier than his occupation as a prose fiction writer, he’d once tried the craft of poetry, which led him to the collection of The People of Thursday Evening.6 No later, he arrived at the conclusion that becoming a novelist in Children’s Literature could prove him a more fitting business. He could best designate, distinct, and be selective of his narrative style in literature for the little ones— to which The Night’s Train (1999) and The Emperor of Words (2002) bear testimony. Further that clarity plays a most decisive and significant factor in his works can be corroborated by the excerpt below:
We oughtta make progress on the battle field. We oughtta not fear the tanks and cannons. And perhaps there may even be laid mines. If one isn’t mindful, he may put his foot on the mine, and just say ouch and die. I’ll order the charge and will charge at the enemy side with my soldiers. The enemy, filled with fright, fires but we do not fear. Suddenly several shells are discharged and like in movies, the interior of the room is filled with smoke.
This extracted from The Good Night, Commander (2014) is evidential to Akbarpour’s credit and talent— of how he can shape and influence such themes of loss, resilience, and hope into one flower of humor. Akbarpour has vitalized his literature with sustenance of the domestic and global conflicts that have taken place in the progress of Iran’s modern history. Despite these hostilities, Akbarpour knows the best way to fulfill literature’s end; that is, to sugar coat the reality and excite its vitality in a way that’ll thaw to leave such sweet glacial residue on the reader’s tongue.
Alireza Goldouzian: Gradually grown into the mastery of the patience necessary for the conduct of his own craft, the first anticipation that Goldouzian bore in regard to illustration included a lack of variety, which presented it to his dislike. He was on the mind that the same routine approach had to be applied on to every piece of his design, amounting to his grief of enjoyment. However now, the illustrations of more than 160 books are vouched to his credit. Looking up to role model illustrators and his perseverance for correct representation were just the propellers he needed for his betterment.
Coinciding with his mother’s passing, Goldouzian expresses to the TUTI Books’ interviewer as such his challenges in illustrating his award-winning notable work, i.e. The Pomegranate Girl (2024), “I felt a commitment to myself that I shouldn’t let my sorrow and sadness into the work.” Also, surprising it is to note that the rewriting of The Pomegranate Girl, though Shirin Akhgar is credited to be its original authoress, marked the point for the alliance between Goldouzian and another favourite writer that was to be hence nominated by his side— Ahmad Akbarpour.
For the record, commitment to be encompassing as to capture a story’s allusions in picture is not something possibly promising to everyone’s merit. However, Goldouzian outstands the majority of Iranian illustrators in this regard, as in The Old Berries of My Tree (2024), he succeeds to cultivate the story’s dichotomy of nature vs. civilization.
“I like to reduce the details and make my characters more targeted to enable them to express themselves,” asserts Goldouzian to the DPI Magazine interviewer, but that cannot account for the perception of a minimalistic approach in his illustrations— reinforcing their lyrical and emotive effects, as shown to the right. The one to the right expressively accounts for his exploratory keenness on fantasy and comic genres— which he justifies as follows: “[That’s] where stunning visual worlds can come to life through the vivid imagination” (DPI Mag interview).7
Reverting to Goldouzian, he since no longer bore the same mindset preceding his late mother, after the span of a year, he successfully enrolled himself back to the job… and the outcome couldn’t have been better put to word than by his person, “Because my mood had changed and so [had] my personality… It [turned out] as if a new person had done the rest of the work”.8 9
The winners of the 2026 Hans Christian Andersen Awards are expected to be announced in April 2026 during the Bologna Children’s Book Fair. This follows the pattern of previous award cycles, such as in 2024 when the winners were revealed at the IBBY Press Conference on April 8 at the Bologna fair. The awards will be officially presented at the 40th IBBY World Congress, scheduled to take place in Ottawa, Canada, from August 6 to 9, 2026 .
References:
- “Hans Christian Andersen Award,” International Board on Books for Young People. March 2025.https://www.ibby.org/awards-activities/awards/hans-christian-andersen-award
- Gilstrup, Eva. “The Hans Christian Andersen Awards 1956-2002,” IBBY, Gyldendal, 2002, www.ibby.org.
- “Farshid Mesghali,” Iran Art Mag Retrieved March 2025. https://artmag.ir/en/farshidmesghali/
- “Moradi Kermani, Houshang”. Iranian Association of Writers for Children and Youth. http://nevisak.ir/enمرادی-کرمانی-هوشنگ//
- “2014 Hans Christian Andersen Awards Shortlist”. IBBY, March 2014, www.ibby.org.
- “Author: Ahmad Akbarpour,” Ketabane. https://www.ketabane.org/products/author.
- “Alireza Goldouzian Dossier, 2024: Iranian Nomination for The Hans Christian Andersen Illustrator Award”, Children’s Book Council of Iran. 2023. https://www.ibby.org.
- “Alireza Goldoouzian, the Illustrator Who Went form the Reluctant to Renowned!” TUTI Books. May 2024. https://tutibooks.com.
- “Alireza Goldouzian”. Visual Arts Magazine. Feb. 2022, https://artymag.ir.
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