Francis Kerline : « Cette traduction de David Foster Wallace m’a presque rendu fou »

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TL;DR

The teaser of a 2015 Books magazine interview with Francis Kerline, the French translator of Infinite Jest (L’Infinie Comédie, Éditions de l’Olivier, 2015 — nineteen years after the 1996 English publication). Kerline calls the job a near-nightmare: two and a half years, a trap at every word, a deliberately lopsided syntax, sentences sometimes a page and a half long, and endless tennis digressions. His headline line is that if he ever met Wallace, the first word he would say to him would be “Enfoiré.” (bastard — gloss ours). Under the provocation sits a genuine craft argument: the novel's mal écrit, blurred, draft-like quality is not a failure but exactly what Wallace intended, and reproducing that intentional untidiness in French was the work. The other kept morsel is the title-decision story — Kerline favored Infinie Facétie, but the publisher chose L’Infinie Comédie as a nod to Dante. Only the open teaser is held; the full interview sits behind a donor wall.

Key claims

The translation as near-nightmare. The framing paragraph tallies the ordeal: two and a half years of work, a trap at every word (des pièges à chaque mot), a deliberately unsteady syntax, sentences sometimes a page and a half long, and endless digressions on tennis. Translating Infinite Jest was, for Kerline, an adventure close to a nightmare.
“Enfoiré.” Asked (in the framing) what he would say to Wallace if he had the chance to meet him, Kerline's first word would be Enfoiré — bastard / asshole (gloss ours). It is affectionate exasperation, the signature line of the piece and the source of its title, “Cette traduction … m’a presque rendu fou” (this translation almost drove me mad — gloss ours).
The messiness is deliberate — Wallace wrote the book he wanted. Kerline's one extended statement: he thinks Wallace wrote the book he wanted, with great sincerity; if one can consider the work badly written because the syntax is disturbed, one has to realize he conceived it that way. Kerline had to work to produce the blur (ce flou), the draft-like quality (ce côté brouillon) that makes it a cult novel.
Kerline's standing as a translator. He is described as a highly regarded French translator who has notably translated Will Self, Jonathan Lethem and Hubert Selby Jr. for Éditions de l’Olivier.
The title comes from Hamlet — and the French title was a publisher's call. Infinite Jest, Kerline explains, is an expression from the famous Act V scene of Hamlet where the hero brandishes the skull of the jester Yorick. He personally leaned toward rendering it Infinie Facétie, but Émilie Lassus and Olivier Cohen of Éditions de l’Olivier settled on L’Infinie Comédie, a wink at Dante.
The novel in one breath (cut off by the donor wall). Kerline calls it a mythic novel and an enormous job — a fragmented novel, all digressions; in sum, the tribulations of several characters around a fearsome video, itself named Infinite Jest, all in a near future where Canada… (the sentence is cut off where the donor wall closes the teaser).

Theories & evidence

THEORY: Infinite Jest's seemingly badly written, blurred, draft-like surface is deliberate design, not failure — Wallace conceived the disturbed syntax on purpose, and reproducing that intentional untidiness is the translator's real task

Crux: prose-tempo-design
Stance: endorses
Evidence:
- [S — FR] Kerline opens by crediting the intention: “Je pense que David Foster Wallace a écrit le livre qu’il voulait, avec beaucoup de sincérité” (I think David Foster Wallace wrote the book he wanted, with great sincerity — gloss ours). [block quote, framing]
- [S — FR] The design claim proper: “Si l’on peut considérer que l’ouvrage est mal écrit, parce que la syntaxe est perturbée, il faut se dire qu’il l’a envisagé ainsi” (if one can consider the work badly written, because the syntax is disturbed, one has to tell oneself he envisaged it that way — gloss ours). [same block quote]
- [S — FR] The translator's labour to reproduce the untidiness: “Il a fallu que je travaille pour qu’il y ait ce flou, ce côté brouillon qui en fait un roman culte” (I had to work so that there would be this blur, this draft-like quality that makes it a cult novel — gloss ours). [same block quote]
Notes: Firsthand translator/critic voice (Kerline speaks French; these are his own words, quotable verbatim — NOT back-translation). A clean prose-tempo-design endorsement from the design pole: the broken/messy sentence is read as chosen, not accidental, and specifically as a thing the translator had to rebuild. The framing paragraph's “une syntaxe volontairement bancale” (a deliberately unsteady syntax — gloss ours) is the journalist's convergent phrasing of the same claim. No in-source pushback: Kerline raises the “mal écrit” charge only to answer it, so there is no counter-position to log.

THEORY: The title Infinite Jest is a Hamlet borrowing — the Act V graveyard scene where Hamlet holds Yorick's skull ("a fellow of infinite jest")

Crux: hamlet-frame
Stance: mentions
Evidence:
- [S — FR] Kerline: “Infinite Jest, c’est une expression issue de la fameuse scène de l’acte V d’Hamlet où le héros brandit le crâne du bouffon Yorick” (Infinite Jest is an expression from the famous Act V scene of Hamlet where the hero brandishes the skull of the jester Yorick — gloss ours). [reply on how he would describe the novel]
Notes: A mentions-grade sighting: Kerline states the title's Hamlet provenance as a known fact (correctly — the phrase is Hamlet's, 5.1, over Yorick's skull) and uses it to gloss the difficulty of the title choice, but advances no interpretation of Hamlet as an organizing intertext of the novel (hamlet-frame's actual crux). A mention-level sighting only. The title-decision anecdote attached to it (Infinie Facétie vs. L’Infinie Comédie / the Dante nod) is translation/reception material with no home slug (title-choice, not a novel crux).

CONNECTION: The translator's testimony to Infinite Jest's fragmented, digression-laden construction — a “roman morcelé, tout en digressions”, with endless tennis digressions and page-and-a-half sentences

Crux: encyclopedic-design
Stance: mentions
Evidence:
- [S — FR] The framing paragraph's tally: “des phrases parfois longues d’une page et demi, des digressions à n’en plus finir sur le tennis” (sentences sometimes a page and a half long, endless digressions on tennis — gloss ours). [framing paragraph]
- [S — FR] Kerline's own structural verdict: the novel is “un roman morcelé, tout en digressions” (a fragmented novel, all digressions — gloss ours), whose plot is “les tribulations de plusieurs personnages autour d’une vidéo redoutable, baptisée Infinite Jest” (the tribulations of several characters around a fearsome video, named Infinite Jest — gloss ours). [reply on how he would describe the novel]
Notes: mentions-grade reception texture, not an argument: Kerline describes the fragmented/digressive sprawl (and the tennis material) as the novel's texture but does not argue it as a self-conscious encyclopedic bid (encyclopedic-design's actual crux). Thin — logged for the sighting count, do NOT upgrade. This is the point where the source's descriptive language most nearly touches a structural slug; the endnote apparatus and the scale-of-cuts questions (endnotes-function, ij-cuts) are NOT touched anywhere in the held teaser.

Themes

Translation as craft and ordeal (the near-nightmare framing; two and a half years; a trap at every word; presque rendu fou); the deliberately broken syntax as design (the mal écrit / envisagé ainsi argument; the flou / brouillon the translator had to rebuild); the Hamlet provenance of the title (the Act V / Yorick scene) and the French title-choice decision (Infinie Facétie vs. L'Infinie Comédie, the Dante wink); the fragmented, digression-laden structure (the page-and-a-half sentences; the endless tennis digressions; the roman morcelé); the plot in one breath (the fearsome video, the near-future Canada frame); and the translator's exasperated affection for the author (Enfoiré).

Cross-references

blumenbach-trashpool-2011 — the German translator's long interview; the natural companion in the translator-testimony cluster. Where Blumenbach dwells on the 28 technical jargons and the buried encyclopedic knowledge, Kerline dwells on the deliberately untidy syntax he had to reproduce — the same Wallace-wrote-exactly-the-book-he-intended conviction arriving from a second translator's desk.
nesi-minimaetmoralia-intervista — the first Italian translator's interview; the third leg of the translator cluster. Nesi's craft appreciation (the endnote-placement lesson, the double-speed prose) and Kerline's messiness-is-deliberate argument are convergent readings of the novel's intentional difficulty from different languages.
The Hamlet graveyard scene — Kerline's account of the title (Act V, Yorick's skull) sits beside the archive's other treatments of Hamlet as the novel's organizing intertext.

Notable passages

Kerline's words unless marked (the framing/plot descriptors are the journalist's). French is the verbatim anchor; the English in parentheses is our gloss (paraphrase). The source's own quoted matter appears in « … » guillemets; French typography is reproduced as printed.

“Cette traduction de David Foster Wallace m’a presque rendu fou” (this translation of David Foster Wallace almost drove me mad — gloss ours) — the title, given as Kerline's line.
“Enfoiré.” (bastard / asshole — gloss ours) — the first word he says he would say to Wallace if he met him.
“Je pense que David Foster Wallace a écrit le livre qu’il voulait, avec beaucoup de sincérité” (I think David Foster Wallace wrote the book he wanted, with great sincerity — gloss ours).
“Si l’on peut considérer que l’ouvrage est mal écrit, parce que la syntaxe est perturbée, il faut se dire qu’il l’a envisagé ainsi” (if one can consider the work badly written, because the syntax is disturbed, one has to tell oneself he envisaged it that way — gloss ours).
“Il a fallu que je travaille pour qu’il y ait ce flou, ce côté brouillon qui en fait un roman culte” (I had to work so that there would be this blur, this draft-like quality that makes it a cult novel — gloss ours).
Journalist (framing): “Deux ans et demi de travail, des pièges à chaque mot, une syntaxe volontairement bancale, des phrases parfois longues d’une page et demi, des digressions à n’en plus finir sur le tennis” (two and a half years of work, a trap at every word, a deliberately unsteady syntax, sentences sometimes a page and a half long, endless digressions on tennis — gloss ours); the job was “une aventure proche du cauchemar” (an adventure close to a nightmare — gloss ours).
“Infinite Jest, c’est une expression issue de la fameuse scène de l’acte V d’Hamlet où le héros brandit le crâne du bouffon Yorick” (Infinite Jest is an expression from the famous Act V scene of Hamlet where the hero brandishes the skull of the jester Yorick — gloss ours).
“je penchais pour la traduire par Infinie Facétie, mais Émilie Lassus et Olivier Cohen, des Éditions de l’Olivier, ont tranché en faveur de L’Infinie Comédie, un clin d’œil à Dante” (I leaned toward rendering it Infinie Facétie, but Émilie Lassus and Olivier Cohen of Éditions de l’Olivier settled on L’Infinie Comédie, a wink at Dante — gloss ours).
“un roman morcelé, tout en digressions” (a fragmented novel, all digressions — gloss ours); the plot is “les tribulations de plusieurs personnages autour d’une vidéo redoutable, baptisée Infinite Jest” (the tribulations of several characters around a fearsome video, named Infinite Jest — gloss ours).

Accuracy notes

"Editions" vs "Éditions." The source spells the publisher inconsistently: “les Editions de l’Olivier” without the accent at one point (in the bio line), and “Éditions de l’Olivier” with the accent elsewhere (twice, including the book-credit line). Reproduced as printed (cite-as-written); the house's own name is Éditions de l’Olivier.
The Hamlet act is correct. Kerline places the phrase in “l’acte V d’Hamlet” — Act V — over Yorick's skull; this is right (the graveyard scene is Hamlet 5.1), not a slip.