Chateaubriand and East Asia

Inalco, the Inalco Foundation and the Société Chateaubriand propose to organize an international symposium dedicated to "Chateaubriand and East Asia" on June 24, 2026.
Portrait de Chateaubriand méditant sur les ruines de Rome
Colloque "Chateaubriand et l'Asie Orientale" © Portrait de Chateaubriand méditant sur les ruines de Rome, Anne-Louis Girodet‎

The Inalco, the Fondation Inalco and the Société Chateaubriand are organizing in June 2026,at Inalco, a one-day international symposium around the theme "Chateaubriand and East Asia". This project is under the scientific aegis of Professors Emmanuel Lozerand and Sébastien Baudoin and the auspices of Henry Zipper de Fabiani, President of the Société Châteaubriand, 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 enables us to better take the measure of a two-way influence that enabled both the author to apprehend the unknown that is Japan at that time and much later, Japan to grasp Chateaubriand's work in the XXth century bytranslating it and reading it in a particular way, specific to its culture and history. Extended to East Asia, this reception of Chateaubriand takes on a very special relief.

In the wake of Raymond Schwab's seminal book, La Renaissance orientale (1950; reed., Paris, Les Belles Lettres, 2024), the purpose of this one-day international colloquium will be to examine the rapports between Chateaubriand and the Far East(essentially Japan, Korea and China), from several angles: firstly, on the relationship tothe imaginary of countries yet little known and which arouse a certain fascination, expressed through the dream of elsewhere and of a still diffuse exoticism, but also through the mediation of small objects (ceramics in particular), Chateaubriand, but also Balzac, Stendhal and Flaubert, who share the fascination of the author of Mémoires d'outre-tombe for this still unknown part of the world.

The examination will then focus on translations of Chateaubriand in Japan and Korea, considering the reception of the author and the more technical way in which his texts have been adapted into a language far removed from the French language. The occasion will be used, more broadly, to question what retained Japan or Korea in Chateaubriand's work particularly, the aspects that interested these two countries in his work.

More generally, it is to a better understanding of the relationship between French literature and its reception in East Asia that this colloquium intends to contribute, to also open up on Romantic, Realist and Post-Realist literature in the 19th century, prior to Japan's new integration into the concert of nations at the heart of the 19th century, which would lead to an infatuation among French artists, from Monet and the Goncourt brothers to Proust and Pierre Loti.

Program

9:30 am - Public welcome

9:45-10 am - Welcome remarks

  • Henry Zipper de Fabiani, President of the Société Chateaubriand

10am-10.15am - Foreword

  • Henry Zipper de Fabiani, President of the Société Chateaubriand

10:15-10:30 - Presentation of the symposium

  • Emmanuel Lozerand, Professor at Inalco (Ifrae)
  • Sébastien Baudoin, Professeur HDR en khâgne (UMR Thalim)

10:30-11am - Inaugural lecture

  • "Tribute to Teachers of French and French Culture in East Asia" by Béatrice Didier, Professor Emeritus at the ENS, Vice-President of the Société Chateaubriand

11am-11:15am - Break

11:15am - 11:45am - First talk

  • Sébastien Baudoin, "Représentations romantiques de l'Asie orientale, de Chateaubriand à Flaubert"

11h45-12h15 - Deuxième intervention

  • Yvan Daniel, Professor of Comparative Literature (University of Clermont Auvergne), "Sur un rêve spirituel et littéraire du XIXesiècle: la conversion de la Chine au catholicisme, des récits missionnaires à l'œuvre de Paul Claudel (1840-1900)"

12:15-12:30 - Q&A

12:30 - Lunch

14:00-14:10 - Presentation

  • Christophe Tournu, Professor of English Literature and Civilization at the University of Strasbourg: " Translating means bringing worlds into dialogue as much as words. The encounter between Milton and Chateaubriand"

14:10-14:40 - Troisième intervention

  • Ono Ushio, Honorary Professor at Chuô University, Tôkyô, "De quelques caractéristiques des Mémoires d'Outre-Tombe vues par un traducteur japonais"

14h40-15h10 - Quatrième intervention

  • Emmanuel Lozerand (Inalco - Ifrae): "Translating René into Japanese (1902-1938)"

15h10-15h30 - Questions and answers

15h30-15h50 - Coffee break

15h50-16h20 - Fifth intervention

  • Victor Vuillemier (Inalco - Ifrae): "Quelques aspects de la première réception de Chateaubriand en Chine, années 1910-1930"

16h20-16h30 - Questions-réponses

16h30-17h10 - Table ronde autour de la traduction

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

17:10-17:30 - Conclusion and end of the symposium

  • Henry Zipper de Fabiani, President of the Société Chateaubriand