10/07/2026
Women who build culture. ❤️
There was a time when women had to write under male pen names just to have their work taken seriously.
George Eliot.
George Sand.
The Brontë sisters.
This week, as I looked through the photos on my phone from the International Publishers Congress in Kuala Lumpur, I realised something.
So many of the conversations that stayed with me were with women.
Women building publishing houses.
Women championing reading.
Women shaping policy.
Above all, women opening doors for other women.
Some of these women changed the course of my own journey.
A grant established by Her Highness Sheikha Bodour bint Sultan Al Qasimi led me to pivot and make publishing my career.
Emma House said yes when I asked a stranger’s question on LinkedIn.
Gvantsa Jobava unknowingly drew my name from a hat in Frankfurt, a moment that eventually brought me to Kuala Lumpur.
Adibah Omar has shown what is possible when one person commits themselves to building a nation’s reading culture.
Iman Ben Chaibah’s journey, from Sail Publishing to the Sharjah Book Authority, continues to inspire.
And there were many others, from different countries and cultures, connected by a shared belief in the power of books.
Women have always been among the keepers of stories.
Today, many are also shaping the institutions that ensure those stories are written, published and shared with the world.
Women are building cultures.
We are honoured to be building alongside them.
🤍
