An Interview with Ananda Devi. Beyond Façade and Grotesque Spluttering: The Worlds and Work of Literature

ABSTRACT

In this interview, conducted by Emmanuel Bruno Jean-François, acclaimed Francophone writer Ananda Devi discusses the act of writing as “a way of shifting the building-blocks of the real world to create … an alternate world.” Referencing her own creative work and literary journey from Mauritius to Paris, she engages in a profound reflection on the power of literature in creating awareness about the multiple divides of our contemporary world. As she provides critical insights of la francophonie littéraire, Devi also addresses complex sites of belonging and unbelonging to reflect more broadly on the ethical position of the transnational writer, namely in the context of the uneven process of globalization that generates both hybridity and radicalization of identity.

KEYWORDS:

• Ananda Devi
• Ceux du large
• Francophonie
• Mauritius

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Emmanuel Bruno Jean-François

Emmanuel Bruno Jean-François is the Marian Trygve Freed Early Career Professor in the department of French and Francophone Studies, and an Assistant Professor of French and Francophone Studies and Comparative Literature at the Pennsylvania State University. He is the author of Poétiques de la violence et récits francophones contemporains (Brill, 2017) and has published numerous articles in scholarly journals such as the PMLA, the International Journal of Francophone Studies, Nouvelles études francophones, and Lettres romanes. He is currently at work on a second book project that focuses primarily on contemporary Indian Ocean literary and cultural studies and on the creolization models from this region.

Born in Mauritius, Ananda Devi began to make her mark in Mauritian literature when she won, aged 15, a prize at a short-story competition open to all Francophone countries. This marked the beginning of a long literary career that now spans forty years and twenty books, including novels, short-stories, and poetry, and that has seen her become one of the major French language writers of Mauritius and the Indian Ocean. She is published by the prestigious publisher Gallimard and has won many prizes and awards, notably for her novel Ève de ses décombres and Le Sari vert. Her novels have been translated in several languages and her work is studied in universities worldwide. She was made a Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres by the French Government in 2010.