Masatsugu Ono

Masatsugu Ono is a Professor at Waseda University and holds a Ph.D. from Université Paris 8. After early research on contemporary Caribbean literature, his work now focuses on the influence of French literature on modern Japanese literature in the context of Francophone studies. He is also an award-winning novelist, recipient of major Japanese literary prizes, and a translator of works by Samuel Beckett, William Faulkner, Marie NDiaye, and Akhil Sharma.

The project

Title: Francophonie from a Japanese Perspective: Reception, Dialogue, and Rewriting

"Since the late nineteenth century, Japanese modernization has been strongly shaped by French literature and thought, which played a decisive role in the education of writers and intellectuals. This influence can be seen as a specific form of francophonie in Japan. While early translations emphasized canonical authors, since the 1990s attention has shifted toward francophone voices from the Maghreb, the Caribbean, and more recently Africa within a global literary context. These changes highlight Japan’s evolving engagement with world literature. The project explores how francophone texts are received and reinterpreted in Japan, with attention to themes such as migration, assimilation, and cultural appropriation. Combining textual analysis with interviews of francophone intellectuals, it also reflects the researcher’s perspective as novelist and translator. Finally, it situates this reception within the longer history of Japanese writers and artists in France up to the 1960s."

Hosting Institution: Université Sorbonne Nouvelle

Selective Bibliography

• At the Edge of the Wood, translated by Juliet Winters Carpenter, San Francisco: Two Lines Press, 2022.
• Echo on the Bay, translated by Angus Turvill, San Francisco: Two Lines Press, 2020.
• Lion Cross Point, translated by Angus Turvill, San Francisco: Two Lines Press, April 2018.
• “Under the Tokyo Skytree: The Tale of a Refugee from Congo” in Refugees Worldwide: Literary Reportage, translated by Samuel Malissa, London: Ragpicker Press, 2017, pp. 213-236.
• “The Great Noise”, translated by Motoyuki Shibata and Ted Goossen, in monkey business: new writing from Japan, volume 05, New York: A Public Space