A Language of Hope: Non-traumatic Narrative of Transnational Memory in Khodadad Mohammadi’s ‘The Translator’s Tale’

Abstract

Focusing on the memory of refugees, asylum seekers, and detainees, this article categorizes their diasporic memory under transnational memory and questions the seemingly natural linkage between trauma theory and memories of exile. By examining the significance of the action of translation in Khodadad Mohammadi’s short story ‘The Translator’s Tale’, this article uncovers agency and hope in non-traumatic narrative and draws attention to the potential of such a narrative to promote solidarity among different communities and collective memories, contributing to the nexus of memory, literature, and activism.