WHAT MAKES PIERRE FRÉHA’S FRENCH SAHIB A NOVEL OF GLOBALIZATION?: REFLECTIONS OF A TRANSLATOR
WHAT MAKES PIERRE FRÉHA’S FRENCH SAHIB A NOVEL OF GLOBALIZATION?: REFLECTIONS OF A TRANSLATOR

Summary/Abstract: I recently completed a translation project which involved the crafting of the English version of Pierre Fréha’s French novel, Sahib, published in 2006. The English translation of Fréha’s book was published, in 2011, under the more expanded appellation of French Sahib. While this novel -- written by a Frenchman, set in India, and revolving around a French protagonist -- is a text that brings “India closer to France, and France closer to India in surprising ways that are both comical and profound,” it is also a work that defies characterization into a specific type and evades affiliation with a specific culture or literary tradition. The work especially reveals elements and influences that situate it as a product of the global age. Not only does the novel depict characters, situations, events, places, attitudes and values that can only come together, textually or otherwise, in an era of globalization, the novel is in itself an instance of globalization at work. The fictional universe that it depicts, the unchartered territory of its storyline, and the strands that make up its thematic and stylistic fabric make it so.

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