Posts under "News"

Le Bon… Le Mal… (The Good… The Bad…)

Posted by Mr. Transparent 1 Comment
Nov 27 2011

 

Yo! When a French “rappeur” teams up with an American hip-hop star, you better fasten up your seatbelt… Especially if the Frenchman in question happens to be MC SOLAAR, and his “pote Américain” (“American buddy“) is the late emsee and “Gang Starr” underground legend “GURU“!

YouTube Preview Image
Flashback to 1993: GURU & MC SOLAAR in “Le Bon, le Mal ” (“The Good, the Bad“)

• (Guru)

It’s…

• (Guru)

The good, the bad

• (MC Solaar)

Le bien, le mal

• (Guru)

The good, the bad

• (MC Solaar)

Le bien, le mal

• (MC Solaar)  

Il était vraisemblable que tous les faux-semblants
De la farce humanitaire aboutiraient au néant
C’est une boule à facettes comme dans les discothèques
Ça reflète à la lumière et sans elle, ffft ! du vent.
J’aime les images fortes car je suis comme toi
Le poids des mots et le choc des photos

• (Guru)

Hey yo, it’s time to get up,

Time to change the world for some better, cos I’m fed up
We’re gonna expose the wrong that’s been going on
There’s people dying in the streets still
in every city, lots of kids they beat ill
I live in Brooklyn, got boys all over been
around the world and you know that I know…

• (MC Solaar)  
L’homme qui prend le microphone se nomme Solaar
Maître de la rime urbaine accompagné des comparses et de Gangstarr
A Paris en France comme dans la Rome antique
Imite le maître, malgré le mythe comme Spartacus… (limitait le mec)
Qui millimètre après millimètre check l’intellect à des kilomètres
It’s your turn, Guru

• (Guru)
Crazy madness, it’s all I see out my window
It doesn’t matter who’s the president, yo
I hate to tell ya, but slavery is still in effect
Haven’t you checked, us black folks create for ya I make a bet, if you
don’t let the truth out huh
Evil will rule without a doubt And it’s…

Solaar…

• (MC Solaar)
C’est le monde des affaires, OPA sur la misère 
Le réel me nargue, tralalalalère
L’air de rien je doute de l’existance des Dieux
De l’existance du mieux dans un lieu plus pieux
Alors je prends de l’avance, en prenant du recul
Car prendre du recul c’est prendre de l’élan

• (Guru)
I come in peace, but something’s always trying to fright, so
I gotta let ‘em know, gotta let ‘em know
This ain’t no game, bub, cause you could wind up dead
with bullets to the head from the posse’s lead
I’m like your mentor, and this is for your benefit
so hear the noise,cause the rude boys ain’t havin’ it
It’s…

• (MC Solaar)
En prophète de la fête, je suis contre ceux qui fêtent 
la défaite de la fête, alors faites attention
Cette recette intercepte les adeptes trouble-fête
Et le son, domine la situation
Le bien et le mal, situation critique
Problème politique, éthique et techniques, OK man, tout s’explique

• (Guru)
Yeah, my man MC Solaar in the house,
I’m known as the Guru, you know that.
I got the whole posse: Jimmy James, Mikey Moos-Moos, Louche, Blackjack,
The Mack, The Ramses, Soon-E MC, Menelik, Bambi Cruz, Planet Mars
Strike, Kéry James, Boom Bass, Zdar, Démocrates D, 
and their whole entire crew
You know what I’m sayin’?

Taking no shorts in 1993
Peace, it’s the good and the bad, and I’m out


YouTube Preview Image

Almost 20 years later, in a strange twist of fate, a certain “Solar” (not the French MC Solaar), was involved in a “farewell letter” controversy related to GURU‘s death, which occurred last year due to cancer

 



A French-Speaking American Girl Wishes You “Joyeuse Thanksgiving”!

Posted by Mr. Transparent 4 Comments
Nov 24 2011


First une petite anecdote: In English, some people tend to confuse turkey (the animal) with Turkey (the country!) In French, however, some often mishear "dinde" for "d'Inde" (meaning "from India!") Sounds kinda funny, but not too surprising of a confusion after all, since this animal was first imported into Europe from the Americas, the land mistakenly thought by Columbus to be part of India, his original travel destination... Yet another confusion you may say!

 

• Jennie:  ”Autant que je suis redevable (As much as I am grateful) towards ma famille, mes amis, mes collègues…Concentrons-nous sur vous, chers lecteurs: Let us focus on what we have in common, which is that we love and hate French“!

We had the chance to meet once!

She is an American girl, who grew up in New York City, yet she spoke very fluent French! For sometime she was my coéquipière (partner) here in The French Blog, and it was during that time that she shared her thoughts with us about Thanksgiving, and what she is mostly grateful for.

Her name is Jennie. She is a French-speaking American celebrating Thanksgiving!


• Jennie:

“L’Action de Grâce” ou “Thanksgiving” est une fête nationale (national holiday) durant laquelle on mange trop et on compte nos bénédictions (count our blessings).

Autant que je suis redevable (grateful) envers ma famille, mes amis, mes collègues… concentrons-nous sur vous, chers lecteurs. Let’s focus on what we have in common, which is that we love and hate French.

On this day of Sanks-gee-veeng (as our French friends would say), let us count our blessings. I made a list, with the help of un correspondant genevois (Genevan) et un autre correspondant suisse (Swiss), of what we’re grateful for chez les Français, and what we wish had never crossed the pond. (Merci Omar et Sasha!)

Vous êtes d’accord? What are you grateful for?

Je me sens redevable pour:

  • Les Vélibs <3
  • Le vin rouge
  • Le Musée d’Orsay (NDLR: “musée” c’est masculin. Don’t get it twisted.)
  • La cuisine, “specifically anything braised” (Sasha le Suisse)
  • Croissants et café crèmes (« j’adore » -Sasha)
  • Falafels on Sunday at L’As du Fallafel (Sasha)
  • Les manifestations/ les grèves (demonstrations/strikes), « spécialités françaises » (Omar)
  • 2-hour lunch breaks, “like going on strike every day” (Sasha)
  • “All the students in the 5th arrondissement, because they don’t know they have drinking problems yet” (Sasha, verbatim)
  • Sunbathing by the Seine
  • La pluie en hiver (les six premiers jours… après ça ne compte plus)
  • Easyjet and Ryanair *disputed by Sasha, mais moi j’adore
  • Writing at Les Deux Magots and Café de Flore *disputed by me
  • Le chocolat chaud servi dans des bols géants (j’adoooooooore)
  • Tintin, et la Belgique en général (surtout le petit déj bruxellois)
  • Serge Gainsbourg
  • Brigitte Bardot, surtout les yeux
  • Vincent Cassel :  Merci. Merci.
  • L’Institut du Monde Arabe : Funded by OPEC members during the oil crisis,un bâtiment fabuleux

 

« Really, really pretty women, who are way too skinny for most people but not me » (Sasha) *disputed

Non, merci :

  • Men in neckerchiefs
  • Everything blue and white striped
  • Immigration policy
  • No food available after 3 AM (je suis de New York, après tout)


What else? Dites-moi… Why are we learning this language?
Parce qu’on aime. For me it’s the hot chocolate- et pour vous?

‘Appy Sanks-gee-veeng!!

How to Understand French “Allusions” in English

Posted by Mr. Transparent 1 Comment
Nov 23 2011

How many times have you noticed, when reading books or articles in English, that some authors seem to particularly delight in sprinkling their writings with French words and French expressions, although most of their readers literacy in la langue de Molière may in fact be very little, if not next to null?

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Unlike our goal here in The French Blog, which is helping you gain new French vocabulary by inserting it into appropriate contexts, the use of French by these authors can at times reflect some kind of “stylistic pedantry”, if not outright “snobbism.” In other occasions, according to them, it is simply “for lack of a better term”—or let us just say, “the mot juste“!

Now, you may or may not “pardon their French“, so to speak, but whether or not you happen to be a serious student of la langue française, it may prove advantageous to recognize these “French allusions“, and fully understand their veiled significations.

We’ll go together through a few “famous” examples:

  • Amour-propre:
In an article of “The New York Times” (January 4th, 2010), Clyde Haberman writes:
“This wasn’t a case of amour-propre on the mayor’s part. Well, not just a case of amour-propre. It was a recognition that, love them or not, the wealthiest bear much of the freight for services that help those with the least.”

→ Not necessarily as negative as the word orgueil (pride), the French term amour-propre designates self-esteem, and literally means “self-love.”

  • Au courant:
In the “Philadelphia Enquirer” (October 27th, 2011), A.D. Amorosi writes: “Hipness is sought-after and high-value these days in the music world, so it’s fascinating to watch au courant acts trading on the market, fascinating to track their score daily on the hipness index.”
→ ”Au courant” translates literally as “in the current“, and simply means “aware“, “to be ‘in’“, or “in the loop.“
  • Beau Geste:
In his prequel to “The Art of Seduction”, best-selling author Robert Green writes in “The 48 Laws of Power”: “Caesar’s dramatic crossing of the Rubicon was a beau geste — a move that dazzled the soldiers and gave him heroic proportions.”
What is a beau geste?

→ It can translate in English as a “beautiful, magnanimous gesture”, displaying the self-sacrifice of the person who makes it.

  • Bête Noire:
Two days ago, on the BBC website, North America Editor Mark Mardell wrote: “I get the impression that Mr Norquist, with his deadpan delivery and an impish sense of humour, delights in being the bete noire of the liberal establishment.“
And as far as we are concerned, one gets the impression that even intelligentsia writers, such as M. Mardell, often seem “to delight” in omitting the use of accents when resorting to French expressions, either out of sheer négligence (the “mot juste” in this case would then be ”negligentsia” writers), or simply because they do not have such accents at their disposal.

→ At any rate, “bête noire” translates as “black beast“, and stands for “archenemy“, “archnemesis“, “archfoe“, etc.

  • Cordon sanitaire:
In “The Independent” of last Friday (November 18th, 2011), Robert Fisk analyzes the currently tense situation between Turkey and Syria by saying: “A Turkish military cordon sanitaire inside the border with Syria seems to be the favourite.“
→ The term “cordon sanitaire” stands for an area that acts as a protective barrier against a potential danger, either military (as alluded to in Fisk’s article), or a medical one, for example.
  • Enfant terrible:
Not long ago, in the Washington Examiner (November 10th, 2011), Kelly Jane Torrance titled her article “Film’s enfant terrible makes surprisingly tame disaster“, referring to Danish director Lars von Trier.
→ In plain words, enfant terrible, or “terrible child”, refers to someone who is characterized as a combination of famous and outrageous, and often famous *because* outrageous.
You can read more on this Danish director (of “Antichrist” and “Melancholia” fame) and other enfants “encore plus“ terribles in The French Blog’s “And the “Grands gagnants” (“Big Winners”) of the 2011 Cannes Festival Are…“)   
  • Idée fixe:
Four days ago, discussing Germany’s pivotal role in the salvation of the Euro, Guido Westerwelle wrote in the Financial Times: “Sound budgeting is not a German idée fixe based on our historical experience of hyperinflation. It is in the interest of Europe as a whole.“
→ An idée fixe is literally a “fixed idea“, and refers to an “obsessive preoccupation.”
You may remember that the term “idée fixe” serves as a pun for Astérix and Obélix‘s tiny sidekick, the little dog “Idéfix” (known as “Dogmatix” in English.)
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Similarly, you can also look up the meanings of other French allusions, such as “arriviste“, or its equivalents “parvenu” and “nouveau riche“; “les belles-lettres“; “une cause célèbre“; “un cri de cœur“; “un déjà vu“; “une danse macabre“; “dernier cri“; “une éminence grise“; “un faux pas“; “fin de siècle“; “une force majeure“; “un je ne sais quoi“; “un lèse-majesté“; “une messe noire“; “noblesse oblige“; “un nom de guerre” and “un nom de plume“; “une raison d’être“; “un roman à clef“; “une volte-face“; and, of course, “zut alors!“

 

♫ Oui Mais… Non! (Yes But… No!) ♪

Posted by Mr. Transparent No Comments
Nov 18 2011

Some have lately dubbed her “La Lady Gaga Française“ (“The French Lady Gaga“), while others see more in her “The French Madonna“, since she’s “been around” for quite a while now!

Just as it is in the US with old “Madge” (Madonna’s nickname) and Gaga (recall what the word “gaga“ stands for in both French and English!), Mylène Farmer enjoys the established status of an iconic singer in France.

One interesting remark, “en passant“, concerning these three “wicked” ladies, which of course not that many “connaisseurs” of the genre seem to be au courant (aware) of, is that through their special handling of “symbols” and thinly-veiled allusions, both in lyrics and music videos, they all join, shall we say, the “archetypical theme” of what is known as “la Femme Écarlate” (or “The Scarlet Woman.”)

Naturally, it goes without saying that these considerations happen to be somewhat au-dela du cadre proposé (beyond the proposed scope) of today’s post ;)


http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xk9bn4

“Oui Mais… Non!” (“Yes But… No!”)


Tout pas tout dit  

All not all said

Le monde entier

The whole world

Dépends de nous

Depends on us

Destins fragiles

Fragile destinies

Et monde hostile

And hostile world

On devient fous 

We go insane

Tout pas tout dit

All not all said

Mais la vie m’effraie 

But life frightens me

Elle a bon dos

It’s always its fault

Ne voir que toi

To see only you  

Rien qu’une fois

Only once

Rend tout plus beau

Make everything more beautiful

Regarde-moi 

Look at me

Être ou pas…

To be or not…

C’est n’être pas !

It’s not to be!

C’est peut-être chic  

It’s maybe stylish

De faire du toc

To make fakes

Tac au tac, c’est l’ère du toc

Tit for tat, it’s the era of phonies

C’est non

It’s no

Han han bon

Han Han good

C’est peut-être chic

It’s maybe stylish 

C’est l’ère du toc

It’s the era of phonies

Pour l’authentique

For the authentic

On traque du stock

A stock’s tracked down

Du tac au tac

Tit for tat

Changeons d’époque 

Let’s switch the era

Oh oui !

Oh yes !

Dis-moi

Tell me

Dis-moi oui

Tell me yes 

Mais non

But no

Ne dis plus jamais non !

Don’t ever say no!

L’amour, le loup

Love, the wolf

Est risque 

Is risk

Dis-moi oui

Tell me yes

Mais non

But no

Ne dis plus jamais non

Don’t ever say no

Et plus

And more

Mon coeur sous X  

My heart under X

Dis-moi oui

Tell me yes

Mais non

But no

Ne dis plus jamais non

Don’t ever say no

L’amour mon loup

Love, my wolf

Se risque  

Is risked

Dis-moi oui

Tell me yes

Mais non

But no

Dieu, mon dieu que c’est long

Gid, my Gid how it’s long

Sans toi

Without you

Mon corps sous X 

My body under X

Call me now

Allongée sur le dos

Lying on my back

L’amour rend tout plus beau

Love makes everything more beautiful

Oh-oh-oh-oh

Oh-oh-oh-oh

Dis-moi oui

Tell me yes

Mais non  

But no

Ne dis plus jamais non

Don’t ever say no

Amour, le loup, c’est ton nom

Love, wolf, it’s your name

Tout pas tout dit

All not all said

Ode à la vie 

Ode to life

La mort compose 

Death composes

La nuit se couche

Night falls

Les yeux rougis

Eyes turned red

L’aube est morose

The dawn is grim

Tout pas tout dit 

All not all said

Si la vie est gaie

If life is cheerful

Tout va à l’eau

Everything goes to water

Oh bateau ivre 

Oh drunken boat

Et joie de vivre

And joie de vivre

Me fait défaut 

I lack

Regarde-moi 

Look at me

Être ou pas…

To be or not…

C’est n’être pas !

It’s not to be!

“SouVenez-Vous, SouVenez-Vous” (“Remember, Remember, the Vth of NoVember”)

Posted by Mr. Transparent No Comments
Nov 5 2011

Voilà V‘s ”RéVélation de la RéVolution” (“ReVelation of the ReVolution“):


- “SouVenez-Vous, souVenez-Vous“

(“Remember, remember“)

- “SouleVez-Vous, souleVez-Vous“ 

(“Rise Up, Rise, Up“)

 

- “Souvenez-Vous, souVenez-Vous…

Du 5 noVembre”

(“Remember, remember…

The 5th of NoVember…“) 

YouTube Preview Image
French Version of “V for Vendetta”

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x2qtdx

Original Version of V‘s Valorous Speech

- Qui êtes-vous ?

- Qui ? “Qui” n’est autre que la forme qui résulte de la fonction de “Qu’est-ce que”, et ce que je suis c’est un homme sous un masque.

- Ça, je le vois.

- De toute évidence. Je ne mets pas en doute ton sens de l’observation, je ne fais que mettre en exergue le paradoxe qui est de demander à un homme masqué qui il est.

- Oh ? D’accord. 

- Mais en cette nuit des plus favorables, daigne me permettre, à défaut d’un banal sobriquet, de te présenter les caractéristiques de ce dramatis personae.

Voilà ! Vois en moi l’image d’un humble vétéran de vaudeville, distribué vicieusement dans les rôles de victime et de vilain par les vicissitudes de la vie. Ce visage, plus qu’un vil vernis de vanité, est un vestige de la vox populi aujourd’hui vacante, évanouie.

Cependant, cette vaillante visite d’une vexation passée se retrouve vivifiée et a fait vœu de vaincre cette vénale et virulente vermine vantant le vice et versant dans la vicieusement violente et vorace violation de la volition. Un seul verdict : la vengeance.

Une vendetta telle une offrande votive mais pas en vain car sa valeur et sa véracité viendront un jour faire valoir le vigilant et le vertueux.

En vérité, ce velouté de verbiage vire vraiment au verbeux alors laisse-moi simplement ajouter que c’est un véritable honneur que de te rencontrer. Appelle-moi V.

- Êtes-vous une sorte de malade mental ?

 - Who are you?

- Who?- Who is but the form following the function of what, and what I am is a man in a mask.

- Well, I can see that.

- Of course you can. I’m not questioning your powers of observation, I’m merely remarking upon the paradox of asking a masked man who he is

- Oh, right.
- But on this most auspicious of nights, permit me then, in lieu of the more commonplace sobriquet, to suggest the character of this dramatis persona.

Voilà!

In view, a humble vaudevillian veteran cast vicariously as both victim and villain by the vicissitudes of Fate. This visage, no mere veneer of vanity, is a vestige of the vox populi, now vacant, vanished.

However, this valorous visitation of a bygone vexation stands vivified and has vowed to vanquish these venal and virulent vermin vanguarding vice and vouchsafing the violently vicious and voracious violation of volition!

The only verdict is vengeance.

A vendetta held as a votive, not in vain, for the value and veracity of such shall one day vindicate the vigilant and the virtuous. 

Verily, this vichyssoise of verbiage veers most verbose, so let me simply add that it’s my very good honor to meet you and you may call me “V“.

- Are you like a crazy person?



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