Chateaubriand and East Asia

The Inalco, the Inalco Foundation, and the Chateaubriand Society are organizing in June 2026, at Inalco, a one-day international symposium on the theme “Chateaubriand and East Asia”. This project is under the academic leadership of Professors Emmanuel Lozerand and Sébastien Baudoin and is sponsored by Henry Zipper de Fabiani, President of the Chateaubriand Society, with the support of the French Institute for Research on East Asia (IFRAE). 

Europe’s and France’s renewed interest in Japan dates back to the revolutionary and post-revolutionary periods: examining the case of Chateaubriand thus allows us to better appreciate a two-way influence that enabled the author to grasp the unknown that was Japan at that time and, much later, for Japan to engage with Chateaubriand’s work in the 20th century by translating it and interpreting it in a unique way, specific to its culture and history. Extended to East Asia, this reception of Chateaubriand takes on a very special significance.

Following in the wake of Raymond Schwab’s seminal book, La Renaissance orientale (1950; reprinted, Paris, Les Belles Lettres, 2024), the purpose of this international symposium will be to examine the relationships between Chateaubriand and the Far East (primarily Japan, Korea, and China) from several perspectives: first, his relationship to the imagination of countries still relatively unknown and which evoke a certain fascination, expressed through the dream of elsewhere and a still diffuse sense of exoticism, but also through the mediation of small objects (ceramics in particular), signs of a refinement that lends this distant, unknown world a fantastical dimension—not only in Chateaubriand but also in Balzac, Stendhal, and Flaubert, who share the author of *Mémoires d’outre-tombe*’s fascination with this still-unknown part of the world.

The study will then focus on Chateaubriand’s translations in Japan and Korea, examining the reception of the author and the more more technical manner in which his texts were adapted into a language distinct from French. More broadly, this will be an opportunity to explore what captivated Japan and Korea in Chateaubriand’s work in particular—the aspects of his work that interested these two countries. 

More broadly, this conference aims to contribute to a better understanding of the relationship between French literature and its reception in East Asia, while also exploring Romantic, Realist, and Post-Realist literature of the nineteenth century, prior to Japan’s reintegration into the community of nations in the mid-19th century, which sparked a craze among French artists, from Monet and the Goncourt brothers to Proust and Pierre Loti.

Program

9:30 a.m. - Registration

9:45–10:00 a.m. - Welcome remarks

• Henry Zipper de Fabiani, President of the Chateaubriand Society
• Assen Slim, Associate Vice President for Research (Open Science, Digital Humanities, Science and Society) at INALCO

10:00 a.m.–10:15 a.m. - Introduction

• Henry Zipper de Fabiani, President of the Chateaubriand Society, “Chateaubriand’s Mandarin Cousin”

10:15 a.m.–10:30 a.m. - Presentation of the conference

• Emmanuel Lozerand, Professor at INALCO (IFRAE)
• Sébastien Baudoin, HDR Professor in the khâgne program (UMR Thalim)

10:30 a.m.–11:00 a.m. - Inaugural Lecture

• Béatrice Didier, Professor Emerita at the ENS, Vice President of the Société Chateaubriand, “Tribute to Teachers of French Language and Culture in East Asia”

11:00 a.m.–11:15 a.m. - Break

11:15 a.m. – 11:45 a.m. - First presentation

• Sébastien Baudoin, “Romantic Representations of East Asia, from Chateaubriand to Flaubert”

11:45 a.m.–12:15 p.m. - Second presentation

• Yvan Daniel, Professor of Comparative Literature (University of Clermont Auvergne), “On a Spiritual and Literary Dream of the 19thCentury: China’s Conversion to Catholicism, from Missionary Accounts to the Work of Paul Claudel (1840–1900) ”

12:15–12:30 p.m. – Q&A

12:30 p.m. – Lunch

2:00–2:10 p.m. - Presentation

• Christophe Tournu, Professor of English Literature and Civilization at the University of Strasbourg: “ To translate is to create a dialogue between worlds as much as between words. The Encounter Between Milton and Chateaubriand”

2:10–2:40 p.m. – Third Presentation

• Ono Ushio, Professor Emeritus at Chuo University, Tokyo, “Some Characteristics of *Memoirs from Beyond the Grave* as Seen by a Japanese Translator”

2:40–3:10 p.m. - Fourth presentation

• Emmanuel Lozerand (Inalco – Ifrae) : “Translating René into Japanese (1902–1938)”

3:10 PM–3:30 PM - Q&A

3:30 PM–3:50 PM - Coffee break

3:50 PM–4:20 PM - Fifth presentation

• Victor Vuillemier (Inalco – Ifrae) : “Some Aspects of the Initial Reception of Chateaubriand in China, 1910s–1930s”

4:20–4:30 p.m. - Q&A

4:30–5:10 p.m. - Roundtable discussion on translation

• Moderated by Christophe Tournu, Professor of English Literature and Civilization at the University of Strasbourg

5:10 PM–5:30 PM - Conclusion and closing of the conference

• Henry Zipper de Fabiani, President of the Chateaubriand Society
• Jean Gérin, President of the Inalco Foundation