“Writing Between Languages: Translation and Multilingualism in Indian Francophone Writing” by Sheela Mahadevan

Much of the contemporary Indian literary landscape features writing in English and Indian languages, but Sheela Mahadevan points to the less-studied Francophone writing in India in Writing Between Languages: Translation and Multilingualism in Indian Francophone Writing.

An academic at the University Liverpool and the English language translator of Ari Gautier’s Indian-Francophone novel Carnet secret de Lakshmi (Lakshmi’s Secret Diary), Mahadevan focuses on writers both from former French territories of India as well as writers from other regions in India.

When Mahadevan examines Gautier’s work, she includes reflections from her own process as a translator. Gautier was born in 1965 in Madagascar to a Tamil father and a Malagasy mother and was raised and educated in Pondicherry. Mahadevan points to the tension in Pondicherry “shaped by the conflicting dynamics of decolonization and the memorialization of its French past” and argues that “Gautier’s multilingual writing echoes both these processes and dynamics”.

The writers that Mahadevan features in Writing Between Languages highlight a multilingualism that many Anglophone writers and readers don’t regularly encounter or consider. The poet Manohar Rai Sardessai (1925-2006) was born in Goa and completed a doctorate in France. Mahadevan describes him as an “ambilingual translingual” writer who “not only composed poetry in Konkani, French, Marathi, and English, but also extensively wrote between French and Konkani via processes of translation, transcreation and self-translation.”

She also looks at the works of two writers who adopted French as a literary language: Toru Dutt (1856-77) Shumona Sinha, who was born in 1973 in Calcutta and is now based in France. Both writers acquired French through study. Mahadevan writes that Sinha’s early works were in Bengali, but “after her relocation to France, Sinha underwent a reincarnation as a French writer, adopting French as her sole literary language, with Mahadevan describing her as both an ambilingual writer (someone who has composed work in more than one language), but with French as her sole literary language, as a monolingual translingual.

Asked about writing in a non-native language, Sinha replied:

“Quant à écrire en français, on ne choisit pas la langue, c’est la langue qui nous choisit.” (When it comes to writing in French, we don’t choose our language, the language chooses us).

The multilingualism used in Carnet was also on Mahadevan’s mind as a translator. She writes that the inclusion of French words in her translation “heightens the visibility of the French strand of the Indian literary landscape” and is a reminder to readers that they are reading a translation. She also incorporated Tamil into the translation and recalls a passage between mother and child, written originally in French with the dialogue taking place in Tamil.

In my translation, I have used multilingualism as a tool to convey the sense that the dialogue is taking place in Tamil rather than in French. Rather than translation “Maman” (mom) into English, I have translated “Maman” into the Tamil word “Amma” (mom/mother), such that the English text becomes multilingual, explicitly comprising two languages, English and Tamil, thereby gesturing to the fact that the dialogue is taking place in Tamil.

These reflections of a translator at work might offer insight for other translators, but also for readers who are interested in the thinking behind Mahadevan’s process. One theme that Mahadevan raises across Gautier and the other writers is that of “transcreation” (which, she writes, combines translation and creative writing), noting that “while processes of transcreation exist elsewhere in the world, nonetheless, they appear to be particularly commonplace in India,” going on to say that writing that “if the source material is derivative, and is already a refraction of the original, then one is perhaps less concerned about the need to adhere to it closely.” 

Mahadevan also explores self-translation, with the writer M Mukundan (Maniyambath Mukundan) known for his writing in Malayalam and his self-translations into French. She makes the case for Mukundan to be also seen as an Indian-Francophone writer, pointing to the Canadian writer Nancy Huston, who won the Governor General Literary Prize for French Fiction for her Cantique des plaines and not a translation prize for a work that some may see as a self-translation of her English work Plainsong.

Mahadevan writes:

Jhumpa Lahiri, writer, translator, and self-translator, similarly argues: “When it comes to self-translation, the hierarchy of original and derivation dissolves. To self-translate is to create two originals: twins, far from identical, separately conceived by the same person,who will eventually exist side by side. In this regard, Mukundan’s French writing may be considered original, and the author may be described as an Indian-Francophone writer in addition to a Malayalam writer.

Writing Between Languages reveals the richness of Indian Francophone writing and the intricate layers of translation.