From author to saint: the appropriations of Victor Hugo and Les Misérables in colonial Vietnam

Abstract

This paper argues that during the French colonization of Vietnam the emergence of Les Misérables as a transnational work and Victor Hugo as a global figure can be traced back to their successful and seamless integration into local literature and religion. Based on the concept of appropriation, a process in which the target text “takes over” the source text, subjecting it to different forms of transformation, a rereading of Hugo and his masterpiece will be proposed through three of these forms: a translation of Les Misérables by Nguyễn-Văn-Vĩnh, an adaptation of the same novel by Hồ-Biểu-Chánh, and an indigenization of Spirit Hugo in Caodaism by Phạm-Công-Tắc. In the light of anticolonial res..