The present paper explores the mechanisms of linguistic hybridity by drawing on (self)translations in/from French across Romanian novels of the 19th century. Albeit the focus of such a study may seem extremely limiting, it actually reveals a rather abundant corpus, as shown by the data extracted from the Digital Museum of the Romanian Novel (a nearly comprehensive corpus comprising 1,227 Romanian novels published between 1845 and 1947: https://revistatransilvania.ro/mdrr/). This owes to the fact that, especially in the latter half of the 19th century, Romanian elites went through a very noticeable “self-colonization” process, which made French essentially become their second mother tongue. On the other hand, from a strictly theoretical standpoint, we show that the discursive co-occurrence of texts written in different languages, thus triggering the process of linguistic hybridization, can open up a fertile avenue for a more in-depth study and reflection on the phenomenon.

Building on these considerations, our paper is divided into three parts: the first part analyzes the phenomenon of (mono-)hybridity in the mentioned corpus, classifying it according to the direction of translation (FR to RO, in the case of Boileau or Alfred de Musset; RO to FR, in the case of Ion Heliade Rădulescu) and the functions of this approach (accounting for a wide range of factors, from the authenticity of the characters’ speech to the legitimization of the authors’ works); the second part focuses on a process we dub double hybridity, i.e., the instances where both the French and the Romanian texts are signed by the same author, which are then “translated” from one language into another (thereby revealing a mutual contamination of the two linguistic codes); the third and final part pursues the process of (auto)translation within novels from a historical perspective, drawing comparisons between the “hybrids” that were ultimately assimilated by the standardized speech practices by the end of the century and those that were not only rejected, but also ridiculed (for example, in Ion Luca Caragiale’s short stories and dramas), thus fueling literary creativity. The findings of our study highlight the functional pluralism of linguistic hybridization, which brings together numerous linguistic, psychological, social, literary, and cultural roles.

La dialectique entre le nationalisme et le cosmopolitisme littéraire trouva sa première expression en Europe au tournant de 1800. À cette époque, le français jouissait d’une universalité incontestée, un fétichisme encore renforcé par les politiques unilinguistiques instaurées après la Révolution. Cependant, face à l’expansion du Premier Empire, les nations voisines ressentirent l’urgence de redéfinir leur identité propre, plaçant la langue au cœur de cette communauté imaginée. L’exemple de l’espace germanique est ici particulièrement significatif.

Paradoxalement, c’est dans ce contexte de montée des nationalismes qu’émergea le premier élan vers une littérature véritablement européenne, dont Germaine de Staël fut l'une des pionniers. Exilée dans le monde germanophone à la suite de son bannissement par Napoléon, Staël trouva, grâce à ses échanges avec des intellectuels d’outre-Rhin tels que Wilhelm von Humboldt et August Wilhelm Schlegel, une source inédite d’imagination littéraire. Elle intégra cette richesse germanique dans son idéal multilingue, concrétisé dans son roman Corinne ou l’Italie.

L’engagement de Staël ne se limita pas au domaine littéraire : il s’étendit également au champ idéologique. Ainsi, l’auteure de De l'Allemagne fit de la traduction une arme conceptuelle contre la logique de domination culturelle, s’appuyant sur le groupe de Coppet. Ce dernier, rassemblé autour de Staël, représenta le premier véritable salon européen et constitua un creuset pour une vision renouvelée de la littérature européenne, tout en jetant les bases de la discipline émergente de la littérature comparée. Dans ce cadre, non seulement la langue allemande, mais aussi toutes les langues modernes européennes bénéficièrent pour la première fois d’une attention affranchie de toute hiérarchie.

Dans ce contexte, notre étude s’articulera autour d’une série de questions concrètes. Tout d’abord, comment Germaine de Staël, étrangère à la langue allemande, parvient-elle à surmonter les barrières linguistiques pour puiser son inspiration littéraire dans l’univers teutonique ? Ensuite, comment interpréter la figure multilingue de Corinne, qu’elle façonne dans une œuvre presque exclusivement écrite en français ? Par ailleurs, comment Staël, qui ne maîtrisait pas elle-même plusieurs langues de manière exceptionnelle et n’a fait qu’imaginer une muse multilingue, défend-elle cet idéal au sein du groupe de Coppet, un cercle imprégné de polyglottisme et animé par des traducteurs renommés ? Enfin, dans le contexte nationaliste du début du XIXᵉ siècle, comment Staël, ainsi que d’autres membres du groupe de Coppet, construisent-ils leur propre identité ? Subissent-ils une crise identitaire engendrée par un double exil ? Chassés de leur patrie d’un côté et non intégrés aux terres culturelles qu’ils ont choisies de l’autre, deviennent-ils les figures archétypales d’une littérature en exil, privée à la fois d’ancrage et d’accueil ?

The readers’ and critics’ reactions to a text can depend on their identity-making personal, historical and linguistic backgrounds and their personal perspectives on historical events. This can be demonstrated with the Latvian diaspora author Ilze Berzins’ autobiographical novel “Happy Girl”. The novel describes the author’s return to her birthplace after fifty years of living abroad. When she returns in 1995, Latvia has gone through Soviet occupation, massive social, political and demographic changes, which comes as a shock to the author when her image of the dreamland home-country clashes with reality.

This story of return and search for the land of origin can be seen from a variety of perspectives. One perspective provided by the Latvian critic Aija Priedīte in her article entitled “No Place for Dreams” (Sapņiem te nebija vietas) (2021) stresses the role of the author in creating the text and her lack of knowledge about the reality of Latvia. Another perspective on the same text is offered in the Lithuanian researcher Milda Danyte’s “Narratives of “Going Back”: a Comparative Analysis of Recent Literary Texts by Canadians of East European Origin” (2005), where the same text by Berzins is seen in a wider context of the need of human beings to revisit and return to the place of origin, starting with Homer’s Odyssey and mentioning a plethora of other similar examples. Another perspective is provided by the author herself. In a video interview the author imagines that the original readers in English had the perspective of putting themselves in the shoes of an expat returning home, while the Latvian readers of the translation see this is as an unwelcome foreigner stepping on their home ground.

The book was first published in 1997 in English, then translated into Latvian in 2019. This research will examine both the original and the translation, as well as the perspectives of the critics and readers of both publications and the underlying reasons for these perspectives.

The authenticity of life narratives is questioned from time and again. Life narratives of historical figures and revolutionaries are considered many at times as documents through which history can be traced, since they often contain first-hand information about these personalities’ life period. The documentation of history by these accounts are done mostly by these personalities’ experiences alone. The limiting factor of considering a life narrative as an historical document is that the narratives tend to be emotive, one-sided and biased due to this reason. This limits the possibility of considering life narratives as the only authentic source of history. On the other hand, these accounts can be crucial since the personal accounts might provide undocumented side of the mainstream history. Through this proposal, I am planning to look into the possibilities and limitations of considering a life narrative as a historical document.