Born: Mauritius, 16 March 1942. Education: Attended school in Mauritius, 1948-62; University of Edinburgh, 1963-67. Family: Married Loga Virahsawmy; two daughters. Career: Active in politics, 1966-87; elected Member of Parliament, 1970; Lecturer, Mauritius Institute of Education, 1982-92; private tutoring, from 1992. Lives in Mairitius. Awards: Winner, Concours theatral Inter-Africain, Radio France International, 1981.
Publications
Plays
Li. 1976; trilingual edition, 1979; as The Prisoner of Conscience,translated by Ramesh Ramdoyal, 1982.
Linconsing Finalay. 1978.
Bef da disab. 1979.
Dropadi: Teks pu en trazi-komedi mizikal baze lor Mahabharata. 1982.
Zeneral Makbef. 1982.
Tatin Madok. 1983.
Dokter Nipat. 1983.
Profeser Madli. 1984.
Krishna. 1984.
ABS Lemanifik. 1985.
Toufann, enn fatezi a trwa ak. 1991; as Toufann, a Mauritian Fantasy,translated by Nisha and Michael Walling, 1999. Hamlet 2. 1995.
Galileo Gonaz [The Life of Galileo]. 1996.
Dokter Hamlet. 1997.
Mamzel Zann. 2000.
Sir Toby. 1998.
Ti-Marie. 2000.
Ziliet ek so Romeo. 2001.
Translations
Zozef ek so palto larkansiel [Joseph and the Amazing Technicolour Dreamcoat], with Gerard Sullivan. 1983.
Zil Sezar [Julius Caesar]. Completed in 1986, published in 1999.
Enn ta senn dan vid [Much Ado About Nothing]. Serialized 1994,published 1995.
Trazedji Makbess [Macbeth]. 1997.
Les Miserables, with Gerard Sullivan. 1998.
Tartchif Froder [Le Tartuffe]. 1999.
Zistoir Ti-Prins [Le Petit prince]. 2001.
Poetry
Disik sale. Written in prison, 1972, published 1976.
Lafime da lizie. 1976.
Trip sere lagorz amare. 1980.
Mo rapel. 1980.
Lobraz lavi: soley fenea. 1981.
Poem pu zafa. 1983.
Twa ek mwa. 1984.
Zwazo Samarel Pelmel. 1987-88.
Kayse ba. 1991.
The walls: an operatic poem. 1984; revised 1999.
Nwar, nwar, nwar do mama. 1986.
Lalang peyna lezo. 1991.
Petal ek pikan, parsi-parla. 1996.
Trazedi SirKutta-Gram: en badinazfuta. 1980; revised as Trazedi Sir Kouta-Gram 001: Enn badinaz foutan—relouke, 2001.
Latchizann pou letan lapli. 1997.
Enn diya dan divan. 1999.
Lintelizans Yonik. 2000.
Kantik. 2001.
Pa Vre. 2001.
Other
Zozo mayok: en komedi mizikal pu zafa morisie (for children). 1980.
Les lapo kabri gazuye (for children). 1980.
Mersi Mama. 1980.
Zistwar Bisma (for children). 1983.
Chanda Mama. 1984.
Testaman enn Metchiss. 1999.
Jericho. 2000.
Jamouna-Ganga-Devi. 2001.
Vignet, Kameo ek lezot badinaz. 2002.
Dayri Enn Fouka. 2002.
Souiv larout ziska … . 2002.
Critical Studies:
La litterature mauricienne d’expression creole: essai d’analyse socio-culturelle by Vicram Ramharai, 1990; ”Dev Virahsawmy” by Edith Hallberg, in notre librairie, vol. 114, 1993; ”Creole voice in Mauritius: Redefining a linguistic and cultural diglossia through theatre” by Roshni Mooneeram, in International Journal of Francophone Studies, vol. 2, 1999; Rencontres, edited by Danielle Tranquille and Soorya Nirsimloo-Gayan, 2000; ”’Translating’ The Tempest: Dev Virahsawmy’s Toufann, Cultural Creolization, and the Rise of Mauritian Kreol” by Shawkat M. Toorawa, in African Theatre: Playwrights & Politics, edited by Martin Banham et al., 2000. Creative Writing in Mauritian Creole: The Emergence of a Literary Language and Its Contribution to Standardization by Roshni Mooneeram, 2001.
Dev Virahsawmy is the leading Creole (Kreol) language writer in the Indian Ocean island of Mauritius. There are only a few such writers (the playwright Henri Favory, the poets Sedley Richard Assonne and Vidya Golam, and the novelist Lindsay Collen), but Virahsawmy is the dean of them all, having opted for Kreol (he prefers the name Morisien) as a literary language since 1967, upon his return from the University of Edinburgh. Since then he has been a tireless champion of Kreol, through his plays, translations, adaptations, songs, stories, and poetry, and interviews. The themes of his literary work have consistently been freedom, hybridity, and women’s liberation and empowerment; and his agenda has been to make Kreol the national language and to elevate it to the status of a world language.
When Mauritius became an independent nation in 1968, Virahsawmy saw politics as one way to bring these themes and this agenda into the public arena. He was elected Member of Parliament in 1970, but was later imprisoned for what were regarded as radical political (and linguistic) views. It was in prison that he wrote his first collection of poems, DisikSale [Salty sugar], and about a prisoner that he wrote Li [The Prisoner of Conscience], which went on to win an international Francophone drama prize and bring Virahsawmy worldwide attention. But it was locally that he wanted to make an impact.
Virahsawmy wrote a play a year in the 1980s as he attempted to create a written Kreol. Most of Virahsawmy’s early work is self-published under the imprint Boukie Banane using a Kreol orthography he developed himself. In the 1990s he adopted the orthography developed by the Kreol adult literacy organization Ledikasyon Pu Travayer (Education for the Workers), and in mid-1999, reached an agreement with the Catholic Church in Mauritius regarding a standardized orthography—the latter had been using a different one for vernacular Bibles. Virahsawmy’s last work using the orthography he pioneered is Testaman enn Metchiss [Mestizo Manifesto], a mixture of poetry, translation (including ”Dover Beach,” ”The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock,” and ”To Byzantium”), and linguistic excursuses on Kreol.
Virahsawmy has a particular fascination for Shakespeare, one which goes beyond mere influence or bardolatry. His last four plays and half of his translations have recourse to Shakespeare, the adroitly translated 1994 Enn Ta Senn Dan Vid (Much Ado About Nothing), for example, and the 1998 Sir Toby (cf. Twelfth Night). As Vicram Ramharai has put it, this is an integral part of Virahsawmy’s quest for a truly Mauritian culture. Nowhere is this clearer than in his 1991 play, Toufann [Tempest], a supremely creative reworking of several Shakespearean plays. Virahsawmy himself has said, according to Rencontres:
I’ve translated Moliere, Shakespeare, and right now I’m translating fairy tales of the Brothers Grimm because I am convinced that such a project follows the logic of cultural creolization (metissage). Our culture is necessarily linked to a world culture. It’s a way for me to share this heritage with all of humanity. This helps to build bridges between peoples, between the past and the present, between different cultures . . . Translations can build bridges between the Tower of Babel’s different rooms.
As this sentiment reveals, Virahsawmy draws inspiration from a wide range of literatures, literary traditions, and musical traditions of the world. He has reworked and mined Brecht, Tim Rice and Andrew Lloyd Webber, as well as The Mahabharat. Mauritius itself is, of course, not forgotten. The poetry collections Kayse Ba [What's up?], Nwar, nwar, nwar do mama [Black, dude!—Black and beautiful], and Enn diyaa dan divan [A lamp in the wind] draw specifically from local Bhojpuri, Creole, and Hindu song and folklore.
Virahsawmy’s works in progress now appear on his webpage. These include, in particular, new forays by him into prose (begun already in Testaman); short stories, in Vignet, Kameo ek lezot badinaz [Stories, cameos and other pleasantries], Dayri Enn Fouka [Diary of a dolt]; and a novel, Souiv Larout Ziska [Follow the road to. . . ].
Dev Virahsawmy has almost single-handedly created a Mauritian Kreol literary tradition, and without respite, but with wit, aplomb, and an unmatched turn of phrase.
