Writing the Self on the Threshold: Cultural Hibridity and (Self)Translation in Jhumpa Lahiri’s In Other Words

Abstract

This article deals with Jhumpa Lahiri’s In Other Words (2016) as an example of ectopic literature and translingual writing. Lahiri decided to move away from her mother tongue in 2014 to start a new literary career as a writer in Italian. Thus, this study examines how decisive the ongoing act of translation is in this author’s literary production. While Lahiri’s preoccupation with cultural translation is a central theme in her English fiction, the author’s wish to translate herself into Italian is more oriented toward an ontological translation of the self. According to Lahiri, metaphors are the cornerstone of this book, as they account for how the author’s thinking unfolded while writing this work. I will also analyse the role of this rhetorical device in this so-called linguistic autobiography. In doing so, I contend that metaphors drive the author’s self-translation into Italian. Finally, I will tackle the fictional thematisation of translation in Lahiri’s first fictional story in Italian, “The Exchange”, as an instance of transfiction. In turn, I will explore how both the author’s self-translation into Italian and transfiction can relate to forms of life-writing.