“Au cœur du harem” (In the Heart of the Harem) and of the Linguistic Blending of Elisa Chimenti. Differential Comparison and Linguistic Decentering

Abstract

This article examines the literary language of Elisa Chimenti (1883-1969), which is full of xenisms, linguistic loans, metaphors and idioms that stem from a transcultural and heterolingual imaginary. Her novel Au cœur du harem (Éditions du Scorpion, 1958), translated into Italian in 2000 under the supervision of Emanuela Benini (Edizioni E/O), is a striking example. Drawing on a differential comparative approach (Heidmann 2017), we look at these texts to reflect on Elisa Chimenti’s literary language and to examine the translational stakes of her work and its heterolingualism (Grutman, 1997; Suchet, 2014).