Babel, or The Necessity of Violence: An Arcane History of The Oxford Translators' Revolution

Book 1 is the story of how a Cantonese boy becomes an English college student as he navigates Language, Migration, and Identity. Robin’s transformation occurs in the cultural context of British imperialism, which Kuang anticipates with the epigraph. This first section is thus Kuang’s introduction of the theme of Empire and Anticolonialism. In crafting Robin’s evolution as a character, Kuang uses and revises conventions of Dark Academia.

Robin’s transformation from Cantonese to English begins long before his mother’s death. Kuang drops clues to show that Richard Lovell isn’t a benevolent savior who rescues the boy by chance. He is, instead, an absentee father who only returns to retrieve his son after the boy’s entire family dies. Despite being absent, Lovell has made a great effort to ensure Robin’s fluency in English by sending him books. This effort doesn’t extend to caring for Robin’s family as they otherwise live in poor material circumstances. Lovell’s hands-off approach exposes Robin to trauma, and his lack of action to protect Robin from these traumas shows that he does not value Robin as a person. Rather, he views Robin as an investment; a future translator who he can use to enrich himself. When Robin leaves Canton, he knows none of this. He is a naïve character who surrenders his Cantonese name out of desperation, but he is also ignorant of the consequences of taking that first step away from his Chinese identity.

The relationship between Lovell and Robin shows what imperialism looks like in intimate relationships. Lovell exercises complete control over Robin’s movement between Canton and England and within England. Robin’s legal status—a ward instead of a son—means he lacks access to the protections of citizenship and family. Without the cover of guardianship, Robin is an illegitimate presence in England even though Lovell and Babel are grooming him to occupy an indispensable role for the empire. The brutal violence and racist language Lovell uses to discipline Robin shows that violence is permissible so long as it advances the empire’s interests. Mrs. Piper, the housekeeper, never comments on Robin’s wounds. Like many ordinary British subjects, she is content to be complicit with Lovell’s (and the empire’s) abuse. Robin can be in the center of the empire but never truly be part of it because Lovell and Babel see him as an exploitable resource rather than a person. His status and Lovell’s abuse show that exploitation and violence are fundamental elements of the relationship between the colonizer and the colonized.

The subordination of Robin’s Cantonese identity culminates with his admission to the Babel Institute. Robin has the credentials to gain admission, but here, too, other students treat him as an illegitimate presence in England. Slights such as questioning his right to enter businesses are demoralizing. The dangers Robin and Ramy face are psychological and social. The encounter with students who want to strip Ramy of his Oxford robes shows that colonial subjects and people of color face potentially life-threatening violence when they enter spaces usually reserved for white elites and citizens. Slights, threats, and violence reinforce the sense of otherness Robin feels. Unlike Ramy, Robin was alienated from his family, language, and country long ago, so he has no resources to fall back on as he constructs an identity at Oxford. His friendship with members of his cohort, however, provides some stability.

Watching how Ramy, Victoire, and Letty navigate the unsafe space of Oxford presents Robin with alternatives to silently accepting abuse. Robin generally avoids conflict and confrontation, usually because that’s what he needs to do to survive. Watching Ramy teaches Robin that he has the power to actively construct his identity even within the constraints of a dangerously racist and xenophobic institution. Ramy playfully assumes identities that British people recognize to get what he needs, which gives him a resourcefulness that Robin lacks. Robin also watches Victoire and Letty deal with gender oppression that directly impacts their education (walking between campus and their off-campus housing consumes hours that could be spent studying, for example). Robin and Ramy’s decision to walk them back and forth to their lodgings allows the two young men to be allies with their female classmates. The challenges all four scholars face counter reader assumptions about Oxford as a meritocratic space where academic study erases all differences; Babel Institute and the university as a whole are spaces where the British Empire’s racism, sexism, and xenophobia are intensified.

Despite his experiences of othering, Robin finds the possibility of being of service to the British Empire seductive. Jerome Playfair uses elevated, idealistic language to obscure that Babel is doing the exploitative work needed to maintain the empire. What Robin is after is after is legitimacy—the right to be in England based on his merit and the status that will come with being a silversmith. His encounter with Griffin, who functions as his double, shows what happens when one is no longer useful; he is a fugitive who escapes punishment because Robin has a power that he does not. Robin’s first act of translation is an illicit one designed to protect his brother, foreshadowing Robin’s rejection of the role the British Empire and Lovell created for him.