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 Translation - French-English - Aux Arbres Citoyens
Current status Translation
| | | Source language: French
Le ciment dans les plaines
Coule jusqu'aux montagnes
Poison dans les fontaines,
Dans nos campagnes
De cyclones en rafales
Notre histoire prend l'eau
Reste notre idéal
"Faire les beaux"
S'acheter de l'air en barre
Remplir la balance :
Quelques pétrodollars
Contre l'existence
De l'équateur aux pôles,
Ce poids sur nos épaules
De squatters éphémères...
Maintenant c'est plus drôle
Puisqu'il faut changer les choses
Aux arbres citoyens !
Il est grand temps qu'on propose
Un monde pour demain !
Aux arbres citoyens
Quelques baffes à prendre
La veille est pour demain
Des baffes à rendre
Faire tenir debout
Une armée de roseaux
Plus personne à genoux
Fais passer le mot
C'est vrai la terre est ronde
Mais qui viendra nous dire
Qu'elle l'est pour tout le monde...
Et les autres à venir...
Plus le temps de savoir à qui la faute
De compter la chance ou les autres
Maintenant on se bat
Avec toi moi j'y crois | Remarks about the translation | - Lyrics from Yannick Noah's song "Aux Arbres Citoyens"
- I'm not necessarily looking for a word-to-word translation (particularly if the result sounds awkward), but something that would really express the environment-friendly message of the song to people speaking other languages. Don't be afraid to be creative ;)
- "Aux arbres citoyens", for instance, refers to "Aux armes citoyens", the French national anthem. You could find something that works with the anthem of the country whose language you're translating to (and we might have alternatives when that language is spoken in more than one country), or, when it's not possible, find a nice way to express the idea in that language without necessarily using the anthem theme.
- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rCH_Fw0qYJs :)
Utilizaţi acest link dacă nu aveţi tastatură cu caractere româneşti.
http://romanian.typeit.org
Atenţie, orice traducere de text, în orice limbă ar fi ea, care nu utilizează diacriticele folosite în mod normal în respectiva limbă, va fi respinsă sistematic.
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| Onward to the trees, citizens! | TranslationEnglish
Translated by  guilon | Target language: English
Cement across the plains
Flows into the mountains
Poison in the fountains
Through our countrysides
Out of tornadoes
Our history is sinking
Our ideal remains
"To strut our stuff"
Buying air in blocks
Filling the balance:
Some petrodollars
In exchange for existence
From the equator to the poles
This weight on our transitory
squatters' shoulders...
It isn't funny anymore
Since we must change things
Onward to the trees, citizens!
It's time for us to propose
A world for tomorrow!
Onward to the trees, citizens!
Some slaps we are due
The watch is for tomorrow
Some slaps due in return
Making an army of reeds
Stand firm
No more people kneeling
Pass the word
It's true that the Earth is round
But who's to tell us
That it is for everyone...
And the ones to come...
No time left to know who's to blame
to count the chances or the others
Now we should fight
With you I do believe | Remarks about the translation | Comment tu la trouves celle-ci, Francky? J'aime pas trop, je suppose qu'il vaut mieux la laisser à un anglophone. |
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Validated by kafetzou - 18 March 2007 15:50
Last messages | | | | |
17 March 2007 01:23 | | | En tout cas je la préfère à la mienne, elle est plus équilibrée, t'as bien fait, en plus je me rends compte que j'avais fait un contresens, à "c'est plus drôle", j'avais traduit "plus" par "+"! Et par exemple "the "equator to the poles" c'est mieux que "from Equator to Poles"!
Par contre j'aimais mieux "to pass on smthg" que "forward", par rapport au message.
Mais comme tu dis, nous autres quand on parle anglais ça sent le latin! | | |
17 March 2007 15:45 | | | I made a few changes - Francky, I understood what you meant about making it close to an English-language national anthem, but I don't see how that's possible - there's none with a line like that I can think of, so I just made it sound "anthem like": Onward to the trees!
I had a problem with "la veille" (here we go again with that) - I changed it to "the watch", but I don't understand what the original is referring to.
I also changed "gusty cyclones" to "tornadoes", but I'm not sure.
"To pride ourselves" cannot stand alone - it's always "to pride oneself on something". Maybe we need a better translation, but I don't know what "faire les beaux" means.
And one last note: I'm really glad guilon did this - I don't think I could have - my French just isn't good enough!
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17 March 2007 18:35 | | | Also, I changed "purchasing air in bars" to "buying air in blocks" - the word "purchasing" is usually only used in a commerce context, and I initially thought of those oxygen bars they sometimes have in shopping malls (do you have those?) when I read the expression, so I changed it to "blocks" to give the idea of purchasable units. | | |
17 March 2007 18:45 | | | Good job! This is a team! We weren't too many of us to do it, and do it well.
I think this time it is validable, but let's give CocoT, the submiter of this text, the last word about it, seems fair this way, what do you think? | | |
17 March 2007 19:07 | | | What about my question about "faire les beaux"? | | |
18 March 2007 11:30 | | | Sorry, I simply forgot it! "faire les beaux" is to "show of", I think, without being sure at 100%
I hope that CocoT (who's a better English speaking than I am, will confirm (or not)... | | |
18 March 2007 15:30 | | | How can that be "our ideal"? I still don't understand. Also, have you asked CocoT to have a look at this? | | |
18 March 2007 15:47 | | 
guilonNumber of messages: 1549 | It means: "our ideal (our goal) is to show off, to attract attention, to get noticed by others"
It's a critical depiction of our exhibitionist attitude. | | |
18 March 2007 15:49 | | | Oh thank you - that's helpful. I'll edit it, then. | | |
19 March 2007 12:06 | | | Could anyone explain the verse "Making an army of reeds; Stand firm; No more people kneeling"? It sounds totally weird when translated into Chinese verbatim.
I don't quite understand the significance of "reed" and "people kneeling" (is the idea of "prostrating" intended here?) | | |
19 March 2007 12:20 | | | "reed" is "roseau" in French, it is symbolically a vegetal which folds itself when for instance there is a very strong wind, but cannot be broken when the wind blows. Means "you can be strong, but you won't break us. In Asia, your fantastically resistant bamboo would illustrate maybe more again symbollically, a resistance (here in the text, resistance by people against the whole mighty decisions of lobbies whose purpose is to make money without giving a dawn about ecology) | | |
19 March 2007 12:23 | | | And about "kneeling", rather means being submited like slaves to these iniquitous decisions mentioned above. | | |
19 March 2007 17:21 | | | "faire les beaux", could it mean something like "doing the good thing"? I'm not sure about it.
"la veille" is "the day before", "the previous day". | | |
19 March 2007 19:07 | | | We've already solved these problems, anneke, but thanks anyhow.
"faire les beaux" = "strut our stuff"
"la veille" = "the watch" (veille has two meanings) |
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