Jean-Marie Gustave Le Clézio

Jose "Butch" Dalisay Jr., a Filipino writer who writes in both Filipino and English, alerted me through his Philippine Star column to this passage from the Nobel lecture of the 2008 Nobel laureate, Jean-Marie Gustave Le Clézio: "True, it is unjust that an Indian from the far north of Canada, if he wishes to be heard, must write in the language of the conquerors — in French, or in English. True, it is an illusion to expect that the Creole language of Mauritius or the West Indies might be heard as easily around the world as the five or six languages that reign today as absolute monarchs over the media. But if, through translation, their voices can be heard, then something new is happening, a cause for optimism." I turn out to be au courrant!