But in the meantime, here's an odd little song .... enthusiastically performed ...... and it's got the words with it .... feel free to regard it as the next installment of " learn a French song a week" ....
Having got through that helpful video about "why we can't understand what people are saying in French films" that I put on the previous post, I thought I would take one of his bits of advice ... to find shortish, clear talky-things on youtube ..... this has the added advantage of being funny and odd as well. Off we go then ... I'm also planning to compile a bit of a collection of stuff like that. But in the meantime, here's an odd little song .... enthusiastically performed ...... and it's got the words with it .... feel free to regard it as the next installment of " learn a French song a week" ....
0 Comments
Well, that's a very good question .... I certainly find them hard to understand, I must admit..... BUT ...this bloke is going to tell you the reasons why it is so difficult. And he has solutions...... not all of them are "easy" solutions... ..... but at least he has got some ideas. .... which is better than nothing ! ... off you go then .... and happy viewing for the future ! I hope you found that useful ..... here's one of those " a bit dodgy" French song videos .... In the previous post (see previous post) (obviously) I showed you two " mystery paragraphs" to translate ... and I wondered if any of you knew where they came from. I said I would show you two-and-a-bit more .... and here they are ... [3] La Tchécoslovaquie tapait dans l'oeil d'Hitler; il n'y est pas allé avec le dos de la cuiller, il se l'est payée. Les alliés n'ont pas remué le petit doigt. Chamberlain est même allé fair du lèche-cul et est revenu avec la déclaration de Munich qui ne valait pas un pet de lapin et où Hitler faisait des promesses de Gascon. Malgré tout, quand il est entré en Pologne, la moutarde est montée dans le nez des alliés et la guerre fut déclarée. [4] Les Franchouillards ont l'art de faire tout un plat de mecs désastreux : regardez Louis XIV et Napo, tous deux des mégalos à caractère de chien. Ils ont ramené leur fraise dans les affaires des autres pays, mais leurs idées de grandeur ont tourné au vinaigre. Un type qui est bien démerdé quand même c'est cette girafe de Gaulle, le gégène intello qui, même quand la France était sur les genoux, a fait des pieds et des mains pour continuer son one-man-show à Londres. [5] L'URSS mal léché, c'est Kroutchev battant sa table avec sa godasse. So ...... I hope you had fun working out what all that lot meant, and maybe you've remembered where you might have read it. It's a book all French learners should have ! And now, music music music .... three "musics" because ..well, you'll see why ..... it's a lovely session with Indochine .... This "exam" ( well, part B of it ) comes at the end of a well-known ( well, I think it's well-known) book which I'm sure many of you will have. But what is that book ? Aha !! Part B Translate : 1. La reine Victoria; j'sais pas si son prince boche, Albert, était monté comme un âne mais, en tout cas, elle et lui, c'était du vrai lapinisme ! Mais qhand son Bébert a passé l'arme à gauche,elle en a eu gros sur la patate, elle a pleuré comme un veau et après, le zizi, c'était zéro pour la question. Ça s'appelle l'ère victorienne: " La sexe ? Nous, on est pas amusés !" 2. L'étranger de Camus est un drôle de zèbre. Sa vielle claque, il s'en bat l'oeil, il fait avaler son bulletin de naissance à un bicot; même quand il va se faire raccourcir, il s'en fout du quart comme du tiers. Two more little passages to come ...next time ..... and now ..this .... That " Ça m'énerve" is quite a useful little phrase, non ? so .... I'm sure you'll want to sing along with it... ... think of it as the next installment of " Learn a French song a week" ..... and here's the "paroles" video to get you started ... Yes, here, as promised, is the 2nd section of that odd and rambling speech of Gabriel's near the end of chapter 14 of "Zazie dans le Metro." Mind you, you might not have recovered from translating the first half yet. So, here we go ..... "Quoi qu il en soit j'ai oint la jointure de mes genous avec la dite sueur de mon front et c'est ainsi qu'édénique et adamiaque, je gagne ma croûte. Vous allez me voir en action dans quelques instants, mais attention ! ne vous y trompez pas , ce n'est pas du simple sliptize que vous que je vous présenterai , mais de l'art ! De l'art avec un grand a, faites bien gaffe ! De 'art en quatre lettres, et les mots de quatre lettres sont incontestablement supérieurs et aux mots trois lettres qui charrient tant de grossièretés à travers le majestueux courant de la langue français, et aux mots de cinq qui n'en véhiculent pas moins. Arrivè au terme de mon discours, il ne me reste plus qu'à vous manifester tout ma gratitude et toute ma reconnaissance pour les applaudissements innombrables que vous ferez crépiter en mon honneur et pour me plus grande gloire. Merci ! D'avance, merci ! Encore une fois, merci !" Et, se levant d'un bond avec souplesse aussi singulière qu'inattendue, le colosse fit quelques entrechats en agitant ses mains derrière ses omoplates pour simuler le vol du papillon. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ There we are ... the English version, as before, will appear after the music . Here's that English version by "Penguin Books" version translator Barbara Wright ... and I must say, she has made a sterling success of it ..... "Be that as it may, I have anointed my knee-joints with the aforementioned sweat of my brow and it is thus that as an edenite and adamite I earn my daily bread. You are to see me in action in a few moments but beware ! make no mistake, it is no mere slip-tease that I shall offer you but art ! Art with a capital a, mark it well ! De l'art in four letters, and French four-letter words are incontestably superior both to the three-letter words which wash down so many vulgarities into the majestic current of the French language, and to the five-letter words which convey no less. Having reached the conclusion of my discourse it only remains for me to give expression to all my gratitude and all my gratefulness for the boundless applause with which you are about to make this welkin ring in my honour and to my greater glory. Thank you! In advance, thank you ! Once again, thank you !" And, springing to his feet with a suppleness as singular as it was unexpected, the colossus performed several entrechats, flapping his hands up and down behind his shoulder-blades in imitation of the flight of the butterfly. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ .... and talking of " prancing about" here's a thing that's not been on here for ages ... Elli and Jacno with a very subtle video (not) of "Main dans la main" ... and here's a thing ..... you could easily be the 666,666th visitor to the site ! Wow. But is that a good thing? Recently I've put two of Gabriel's rather strange, rambling, and certainly entertaining "speeches" from the remarkable and famous French novel " Zazie dans le Metro." This next one is very odd indeed ! But then, so is the "Gabriel" character. It's near the end of chapter 14 .... So, without further ado, let's have a look at the first half ..... the idea being that you can have a go at translating it .... and after the music I'll show you what the "translator-into-English" made of it ..... " Alors, mes agneaux et vous mes brebis mes-dames, vous allez enfin avoir un aperçu de mes talents. Depuis longtemps certes vous savez, et quelques-uns d'entre vous ne l'ignorent plus depuis peu, que j'ai fait de l'art chorégraphique le pis principal de la mamelle de mes revenus. Il faut bien vivre, n'est-ce pas ? Et de quoi vit-on ? je vous le demande. De l'air du temps bien sûr ... du moins en partie, dirai-je, et l'on en meurt aussi ... mais plus capitalement de cette substantifique moelle qu'est le fric.Ce produit mellifluent, sapide et polygène s'évapore avec la plus grande facilité cependant qu'il ne s'acquiert qu'à la sueur de son front du moins chez les esploités de ce monde dont je suis et dont le premier se prénomme Adam que les Êlohim tyrannisèrent comme chacun sait. Bien que sa planque en Éden ne semble pas onéreuse pour eux aux yeux et selon le jugement des humains actuels, ils l'envoyèrent aux colonies gratter le sol pour y faire pousser le pamplemouse tandis qu'ils interdisaient aux hypnotiseurs d'aider la conjointe dans ses parturitions et qu'ils obligeaient les ophidiens à mettre leurs jambes à a leur cou. Billevesées, bagatelles et bibleries de mes deux. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ That's the first half of it ..... by this time you'll have seen what I meant when I described it as strange and rambling and "entertaining." And now, the all-important music ... and then, the "English Version" ... this is Zaz with a "paroles" video of " Belle" ..... ..and this is what Barbara Wright, the translator for the Penguin English version, made of it ... it can't have been easy !
Well, my lambs and you my lady sheep, you are at last about to have a glimpse of my talents. For a long time indeed you have known, and a few among you have recently ceased to be unaware of the fact, that I have made of the choreographic art the principle pap of the udder of my revenue. One must live, must one not ? And on what does one live ? I ask you. On air, of course ... at least partly, shall I say, and one dies of it too .... but more fundamentally on that substantific marrow known as lolly. This mellifluent, sapid and polygenic product evaporates with the greatest facility, while it is only acquired by the sweat of one's brow at least among the iksploited of this world of whom I am one and the first of whom was named Adam who was persecuted by the Elohim as everyone knows.Although this situation on Eden wouldn't be regarded as specially costly to them in the eyes and according to the judgement of present-day human beings, they sent him to the colonies to lard the lean earth to make the grapefruit grow there at the same time as they refused to allow hypnotists to assist his spouse in her confinements and obliged the ophidians to sling their hook. Bibble-babble, bagetelles and biblicisms, and such-like crap. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ When I first read that, I thought "Billevesées" was some slangy distorted version of the verb " bouleverser" or something similar .... but ,er it isn't ! Hey-ho ! I'll get busy doing the other half to keep my mind off my drastic error. Au Gallop Prends ton plus beau cheval blanc et ta cravache et tes gants cours à la ville au plus tôt et regarde le beau château Le beau château dans la forêt qui perd ses feuilles sans regret au galop au galop mon ami tout n'est pas rose dans la vie. That's a poem by P. Soupalt, from Poèms et Poésies. But I found it in a compilation .... this one in fact .... by Jacky Simon In that excellent little book, there are questions at the back ... so here's the "questions" for that one ... 1] Pourquoi prendre son cheval, sa cravache et ses gants? Pour aller à la ville ! Pour quoi faire? Pour aller regarder un beau château .. dans la forêt ! Ce n'est pas à cela que l'on s'attend. De même, pour le dernier vers, est-ce que ce n'est pas le contraire que l'on attend ? I forgot to put some music on .... and here's a fine thing ... a "sign-language" version of Mika's " Elle me dit" .... there's lots more of these " Les mains balladeuses" things ... ..and here's one of many hundreds of versions of the song ..... I thought this special 700th post could do with something, er, special .... Yes, yet another remarkably brilliant and much-need idea from ME. I bet a lot of you have got to the stage where you can read French pretty well, only having to look up the odd tricky word. But ...when you get your dinky pocket dictionary out, you can't find those rare, tricky and maybe even obscure words .... because the dinky pocket dictionary hasn't got the room for them. But there are, of course, much bigger dictionaries about, which will have most of those obscure/tricky/obsolete words in them .... but you can't carry them in your jacket pocket ... no. And then there are dictionaries dedicated solely to those odd, unusual and out-of-the way words as well ... but they're all in a large format too ... well, the ones I've got are. Very large. Bulky Beggars they are. What we need is a pocket dictionary which has only those sorts of words in it. We don't need to look up maison or oiseau or longtemps or nullement any more ..... so we don't want to have them .... all we need is the rarer, obscurer ones. In a portable, dinky format. Pocket-sized. It's pocket-sized because all those words-we-know-already have been kicked out. So ..come on then ... the idea is totally free for any publisher to steal, nick, purloin, cadge or filch from me. Just get on with it. [The book could have a special, high-viz distinctive cover so other people will see you using it and they'll know you're well beyond the "beginner" stage.] Kudos ! Now then ...here's Fredda ... she isn't carrying a BulkyBook like wot I've been describing is she ? No ! I know the French have, er, what shall we call it , a rather more relaxed approach to "this sort of thing", but even allowing for that, there's some right dodgy songs/videos out there ..... and here's an example .... ..and here's an even more notorious one..... apparently she was led to believe the song was about lollipops ..... she had no idea what it was really about .... What I a can never understand about old Serge is that, despite his huge sticky-out ears he still seems to be a magnet to women ? Maybe it's a misprint for "maggot."
|
AuthorLearn French in 88 years .. well, it's a long time, so you might as well enjoy yourself on the way. I hope you are enjoying all the sensible bits as well as the music, the games, challenges, odd diversions, rants, the roads less travelled and so on. I'm on the same road as well. Good luck to all of us. Archives ... monthly listing
September 2021
this blog's email address ....
[email protected] |