A short story that was met with suspicion for possibly being written by AI wins the top prize at an international literary awards.



The prestigious Commonwealth Short Story Prize, an international literary award, has awarded its top prize to a work that has been suspected of being written by AI. Three of the five regional winning works in the Commonwealth Short Story Prize are currently under suspicion of being written by AI.

Commonwealth Short Story Prize - Commonwealth Foundation

https://commonwealthfoundation.com/short-story-prize/

Short story accused of being AI-written wins overall Commonwealth prize | Books | The Guardian
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2026/jul/01/judges-claims-ai-use-commonwealth-short-story-prize-jamir-nazir

Since 2012, the Commonwealth Short Story Award has been held for citizens of the Commonwealth of Nations, which consists of 56 member countries including the United Kingdom, Canada, and India. The award is open to unpublished short stories of 2,000 to 5,000 words, and winners are first selected from five regions: Africa, Asia, Canada & Europe, the Caribbean, and the Pacific. The overall winner is then chosen from among these winners.

The 2026 Commonwealth Short Story Awards received a record-breaking 7,806 submissions, and the winners for each region were announced in May. However, on social media, there were numerous accusations that Jamil Nazir's winning entry for the Caribbean region, 'The Serpent in the Grove,' might have been generated using AI. Subsequently, suspicions of AI use also arose regarding the winning entries for the Canada & Europe region and the Asia region.

Three out of five short story award-winning works are suspected to have been written using AI-generated texts - GIGAZINE



The reasons why 'The Serpent in the Grove' has been suggested to have been written by AI include the presence of phrases commonly found in AI-generated text, such as 'not x, but y,' and the inclusion of several unnatural word repetitions. Furthermore, unique phrases like 'Sun on galvanise is a cruel instrument' and 'She had the kind of walking that made benches become men' have also been suggested to be the work of an AI-generated text.

Granta, the literary magazine that had been publishing the winners of the Commonwealth Short Story Prize online, has issued a statement saying, 'In order to maintain editorial integrity, the Granta Trust Board has decided not to engage in any further publishing partnerships with external parties,' and has announced that it will cease publishing the award-winning works in the future.

Following allegations of AI use by a literary award winner, a literary magazine that published the winning work announced it would 'withdraw from its publishing partnership without editorial control' - GIGAZINE



However, defying these suspicions, the Commonwealth Foundation, which sponsors the award, selected 'The Serpent in the Grove' as the winner of the Commonwealth Short Story Award. The author, Nazir, will receive £2,500 (approximately ¥542,000) for the regional prize and £2,500 (approximately ¥1,084,000) for the overall award, for a total of £5,000 (approximately ¥1,084,000).

The Commonwealth Foundation, in selecting the top prize winner, scrutinized drafts, time-stamped texts, and notes from regional winners in response to comments on social media. The foundation's executive director, Razmi Farouk, commented, 'We are pleased with the testimonies of the authors and our confirmation that they did not use AI in their writing.'

The Commonwealth Foundation has released interview videos of the laureates, and you can see Ms. Nazir's acceptance speech starting at around 26 minutes and 50 seconds .

2026 Commonwealth Short Story Prize film - YouTube


This man is Mr. Nazir.



The story of 'The Serpent in the Grove' was apparently inspired by the author's experience living in rural Trinidad and Tobago.



Nazir says he was influenced by V.S. Naipaul , who was from British Trinidad (now Trinidad and Tobago), and Derek Walcott, the first person from the Caribbean to win the Nobel Prize in Literature.



Nazir says he uses his smartphone's voice recognition function to write. He explains that because the small screen only displays three to four lines at a time, he takes his time to refine his writing before moving on to the next paragraph.



In a statement to the British daily newspaper The Guardian, Farouk said, 'Instead of leaving the decision to AI detection software, we asked the winners to provide work-in-progress drafts, outlines, and evidence of their artistic journey. Needless to say, the software is not perfect and can make contradictory judgments, which undermines the very foundation of the award, which is its credibility.' He argued that writers with unconventional talent are more likely to be suspected of being AI-driven.

One X user commented, 'I am very disappointed and disheartened. It seems that the Commonwealth Foundation tried to stick to its position even after the controversy surrounding generative AI. From now on, I may think carefully again before submitting a work to the Commonwealth Short Story Award.'



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