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Fiction

What if?

An adventure in counterfactuals
by •
September 2021, no. 435

Civilisations by Laurent Binet, translated by Sam Taylor

Harvill Secker, $32.99 pb, 310 pp

Fiction

What if?

An adventure in counterfactuals
by •
September 2021, no. 435

Acclaimed as the most original novel of the 2019 rentrée littéraire, and recipient of the Grand Prix du Roman de l’Académie Française, Laurent Binet’s most recent book, Civilisations (2019), is a cleverly crafted uchronia, or speculative fiction. The author is inviting us on an epic journey that devises alternative key moments in history, from a Viking tale to an Italian travel diary, and from the Inca chronicles to the capricious destiny of Cervantes. Let the adventure of counterfactuals begin …

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Cristina Savin

Cristina Savin is a freelance translator based in Melbourne, Australia. She is the French-to-English translator of Marie Lion and philosopher Marcel Gauchet. Her translations from Romanian have been published in Cordite Poetry Review, The AALITRA Review, Poetry in Process, Coolabah, and Bordertown. Cristina is the assistant editor at The AALITRA Review and is currently undertaking a PhD in Translation Studies at Monash University.  

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