Franco-Ontarian playwright Jean-Marc Dalpé was having a beer with his friend Guillaume Martel LaSalle when their conversation turned to their irritation at translations of the works of the great novelist Jack Kerouac.
Jean-Marc Dalpe
Far too French, they complain. “It smells like the other side of the Atlantic,” said Jean-Marc Dalpé in an interview. It doesn’t fit Kerouac’s Americanism or his language and who he is. Out of this anger, we decided that French-speaking North America should reclaim this French-American author whose parents were French-Canadian immigrants.
This resulted in the multidisciplinary project Kerouac, 100 years on the go! produced by Nouveau Théâtre Expérimental and Productions Jean-Marc Dalpé. After a first version in Rouyn-Noranda, this event, which commemorates the writer’s centenary, stops in Montreal in April and May before being presented in Quebec at the Carrefour International du Theater Festival.
three strands
This extraordinary project consists of three different parts to immerse the participants in the world of the most famous writer of the “Beat Generation”.
The first part is a small exhibition about this novelist. Audio and video tapes show analyzes or fictional works inspired by the man whose real name is Jean-Louis Kérouac.
The second consists of the translation of his masterpiece Sur la route.
“People are encouraged to translate passages of text,” explains Mr. Dalpé. We have a printing press that weighs more than a ton and at the end of each day we publish what has been put in by visitors in a small book. »
In addition, participants are invited to sit in front of a typewriter to translate Kerouac’s seminal work sentence by sentence to arrive at a definitive multi-hand work. The first fifteen pages have already been translated into Abitibi.
This initiative is set to travel across Canada over the next three years.
Cabaret Kerouac
After these two activities, in the evening spectators are invited to attend a cabaret show from the world of Kerouac. Local artists are invited to lend a hand following their inspiration.
Each performance is therefore unique, since the same people do not necessarily go on stage every evening. In Montreal, Daniel Brière will direct this show, hosted by Joanie Guérin and Didier Lucien. About fifty artists such as Jérôme Minière, Joe Bocan, Salomé Corbo and Pascale Montpetit will take part.
“Ariane Moffatt, for example, will offer a new song that is designed with excerpts from Kerouac,” he notes.
“It’s all fun and very sociable,” says the theater man, who was surprised that it went so well in Rouyn-Noranda.
♦ Kerouac, 100 years on the way! will be presented at the Espace Libre on the weekends of April 21-23 and 28-30 and May 5-7.