Sampsa Peltonen

Sampsa Peltonen is a Finnish translator who works in the fields of literature and media. He studied Foreign Languages at the University of Turku, Finland, and deepened his knowledge of various regions and dialects of Arabic through extensive periods spent in the Middle East and North Africa. He has translated novels, short stories, plays and poetry from Arabic and French into Finnish, winning two prestigious Finnish prizes - the WSOY Foundation Prize in 2014 for his translation of Hassan Blasim’s works, and the 2023 Agricola Prize for his translation of Mohammed Mbougar Sarr’s The Most Secret Memory of Men, which won The Goncourt Prize. For his contributions as a language expert, he was appointed member of the National Council for Finnish Language, where he served from 2015-2021. In 2021, he was Chair of the judging panel of the Finlandia Prize, the most important literary prize in Finland. In the field of media, he works as a translator at the Finnish Broadcasting Company (YLE), where he translates documentary films and other media content.