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La Marseillaise (Translation in progress)

Missing image

Step forward offspring of our Motherland,

The day of glory is nearby!

Do you feel oppression's dire hand,

See its gory standard raised high?

    See its gory standard raised high!

Can you not hear those brutal foemen

Low like cattle on our own farms?

They’re marching right into our arms

To devour our spouses and our children!

    Form ranks, you citizens!

    Take up your swords and guns!

    March now! March now,

    Lest blood impure

    Should water where we plough![*]

 

O sacred love of Mother Country,

Guide and support our vengeful hands.

Dearest Freedom, cherished Liberty,

Stand with us who defend our lands!

    Stand with us who defend our lands!

Beneath our flags let triumph’s spirit

Rally to your virile cry,

So foemen, as they fall and die,

They shall see your victory, our merit!

    Form ranks, you citizens!

    Take up your swords and guns!

    March now! March now,

    Lest blood impure

    Should water where we plough!

 

 

 

 

[*]Working note: the last two lines of the refrain are

 capable of two, exactly opposite translations, one

 exhorting the citizens to spill the invaders’ blood

 to water the furrows of the fields of France, the

 other exhorting them to prevent the same impure

 blood from polluting those fields! Therefore the

 last two lines may be read as I have rendered

 them or:

 

“Let alien blood

 Now water where we plough!”

 

 

Author notes

Work in progress - still very much so. There are lines with which I am not satisfied, and several additional verses to tackle yet.

This is a translation of the first and last (adult) verses, including refrain, of La Marseillaise, composed in 1792 by Claude Joseph Rouget de Lisle. It was originally called "The War Song of the Army of the Rhine", but became widely known in Revolutionary France when volunteers from the city of Marseilles sang it - hence its popular name. It is now, of course, the National Anthem of France.

I am only sorry that it is so rushed, due to pressure of work and an impending trip. I hope to return to it and translate the unsung verses some time over the summer.

Please note I have not counted the "couplet des enfants" (children's stanza) as being the last verse, in this instance.

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Comments

1 - 34 of 34

  • GraveyardGoddess
    September 13
    Edit | Reply
    Thanks for sharing; that's pretty.


  • Navajo Apsara gold member
    August 3

    Edit | Reply
    O sacred love of Mother Country, Guide and support our vengeful hands. I really loved thes lines but you do have a awsome penned poem. Keep penning I enjoyed. Thank you very much for sharing


  • rollingzen
    July 14
    Edit | Reply
    vive la France!


  • joshieod
    July 14

    Edit | Reply

    i really like it

    As mentioned, it is very impressive to make it rhyme. I think you have done an excellent job here. I find the poem itself very rallyin g and powerful. It makes me want to go to war myself. Thank you for sharing this with us. Well done


  • adios muchachos gold member
    July 14

    Edit | Reply

    Mairi

    This is pretty decent. The sentiment is marked in the translation and the rallying
    very palpable. I had a feeling Vera was mixed up in this someplace!LOL
    I remember that night at Nick's place! "Round up the usual suspects!"

    Does "Mo d' laun" count as "cut the grass" in French? Probably not!!LOL

    Good luck here, Mairi. Hope all is well your side.

    John

    • Seasinger gold member
      July 14
      Edit | Reply
      In answer to your question, I think the French for that is "coup de grace".


  • Symphony.of.Silence
    July 14
    Edit | Reply
    hurray


  • Amera gold member
    July 13

    Edit | Reply
    What an effort this is! The fact that you were able to make it rhyme is impressive in its self.

    Love,
    Amera


  • Age of Rain
    September 12, 2008

    Edit | Reply
    I am so utterly impressed. Translating poetry from French to English is so VERY difficult. Having had to do so in one of my classes (to little success) I have to just give you a big WOW! I can see the stretches here and there to keep to the rhyme. 'foemen...children' but some renditions of the song in various French accents have similar effect. Well done and best of luck with future improvements!

    • Mairi bheag gold member
      September 12, 2008

      Edit | Reply
      I am not really sure where to go from here, except maybe to tackle some more verses! Of one thing I am quite pleased - I was confident enough about this to put it before Vera Rich, who is one of the best translators of poetry I know (I love her translations of Ivan Franko's poetry - 19c Ukrainian).

      Thanks for the visit and compliments.


  • lilAj
    September 3, 2008

    Edit | Reply
    I met a frech woman while playing chess recently and strangely enough I have become obsessed with the language. It is a pleasant surprise finding this today I truly loved the poetic nature of the translation

    • Mairi bheag gold member
      September 3, 2008
      Edit | Reply
      It's damned hard work, I can tell you! (Have a look at my column on translating "El Desdichado" and you'll see the sort of stuff a translator has to contend with!). Glad you liked this.


  • maa gold member
    July 21, 2008

    Edit | Reply
    I must admit, that even having been a resident of "motherland france" for more than 20 years, I have not (yet) sung, attentively listened to or attempted to understand the national anthem even once ...
    your translation makes things so much easier for me ...
    and what a translation it is ...
    I didn't know that this hymn is so poetic ...
    maybe it isn't, but you made it so ...

    chapeau, mairi !!!

    much love,
    marion

    • Mairi bheag gold member
      July 21, 2008
      Edit | Reply
      Actually it is much more poetic than I first realised. What I wanted to do was to make an English version that was worth singing, and that fitted the tune well. I think I have managed that.


  • Robbwindow
    July 19, 2008

    Edit | Reply

    well done

    I do not remember seeing a poem of this structure on All-poetry format before, so thanks very interesting and well done.

    • Mairi bheag gold member
      July 19, 2008
      Edit | Reply
      Thanks.

      Well, the structure is the same as Rouget de Lisle's original song. As a "form" I think it is utterly unique, but he wrote it to be sung, rather than read.

  • Vera Rich
    July 18, 2008
    Edit | Reply
    Translating this must have been a very challenging task... and you have made a good attempt at keeping the rhyme. Though strictly speaking the first four lines should rhyme abab, and lines 6 and 9 should rhyme (campagne/compagnons is perceived as a rhyme to the French ear). But - after 52 years in the professon I still find often find myself struggling with words which simply refuse to rhyme properly - and wondering whether anyone would notice if I changed the rhymescheme. (Alas, though, the better known the poem, the more they DO notice!)


    • Mairi bheag gold member
      July 18, 2008
      Edit | Reply
      ... and by the way, "foemEN" and "childrEN" was as close as I could get for lines 6 and 9.

    • Mairi bheag gold member
      July 18, 2008
      Edit | Reply
      Well, the task continues, Vera, now I have my teeth into it.

      Personally, I always felt that the rhyme was disguised by the tune, because the melody is rather irregular. I have known it since I was a child, but for many years never realised that there was a rhyme at all. That situation wasn't helped by the fact that the first time I heard it sung in French, the singer (appropriately) gave a Southern interpretation to the words, so that even the most obviously rhymed part (the refrain, from "Aux armes..." to "sillons") was disguised; in the actual accent of Marseilles, "citoyens" and "bataillons" simply do not rhyme.

      This is quite a labour of love, by the way, as I adore the "Marseillaise scene" in "Casablanca". I want to produce an English version that is worth singing.


  • Keith
    July 16, 2008

    Edit | Reply
    There are numerous rude versions of Allons enfants, and it's kind of refreshing to see a proper translation. We often whistle the tune on walks, it really keeps you marching - which is the whole point, I suppose.
    And why didn't Delacroix give Liberté a bodice at the very least? That's whit I'd like tae ken!


    • Mairi bheag gold member
      July 16, 2008
      Edit | Reply
      ... a liberty bodice?

      • Vera Rich
        July 18, 2008

        Edit | Reply
        Oh, BEAUTIFUL!!!

        By the way, there is a Belarusian poem about the Delacrox picture - translated in my "Poems on Liberty" which apparently the publishers (rfe/rl) have now stuck on the web...

  • Vera Rich
    July 16, 2008
    Edit | Reply
    Thank you for your entry... It is a little strange to me to see in English something that I known and sung in French since my earliest years... and I would, I must say, dispute certain of your renderings (particularly lines 3 - 4... do have another look at the syntax here!)

    But it is, after all, as you say only a version in progress.


    By the way.. when I was at school we always sang the first and last verses!

    • Mairi bheag gold member
      July 16, 2008
      Edit | Reply
      Hmmm... well, renderings are often (if not always) disputed. I would say it goes with the territory.

      I have treated lines 3 and 4 as discrete; I take the literal meaning of each as:

      "Contre nous de la tyrannie" - "against us tyranny"
      "L'étandard sanglant est levé" - "the gory standard is raised"

      I can see that if one takes them together and rearranges the words, one can have "contre nous l'étandard sanglant de la tyrannie est levé", and indeed that often is the way prose-renderings of the words have it. However, Rouget de Lisle did not put the words in that order, and the syntax of "de la tyrannie" can be read as an expression of quantity, and the whole line as "facing us is an amount of tyranny". Taking it that way, and paying attention to the rousing nature of the tune in the repeated line, my rendering makes more sense - an exhortation to rally to the banner that the Army of the Rhine has borne into many bloody battles - rather than a cry of warning about tyranny's bloody standard.

      I don't expect you to agree. However, I can assure you I gave the matter considerable thought. One thing we certainly will agree upon is that translation is no piece of cake.


  • Amera gold member
    July 1, 2008
    Edit | Reply
    This is very well written. I can see where this can be sung. Bravo!

    Love,
    Amera♥

  • ea silver member
    July 1, 2008

    Edit | Reply
    This is interesting to come upon. I never gave any thought to the words of the Marseillaise before, though I have recently learned the German national anthem in order to sing it at the EM last Sunday, and found out it's by Hoffmann. Bon Bastille Day!

    • Vera Rich
      July 18, 2008
      Edit | Reply
      ARE there "politically correct" German words now? For a long time the tune had to be played without being sung.. since the old words were considered too militaristic/imperialistic. But I have to say that - apart from some negotiations with the Hanse foundation, I have not had much to do with Germany for some time.

    • Mairi bheag gold member
      July 1, 2008
      Edit | Reply
      I seem to remember something about "Von der Etsch bis an den Belt" and that's all - the Haydn tune is lovely in its original quartet form.

      Thank you for the visit.


  • Oleander
    July 1, 2008
    Edit | Reply
    I like this a lot so far, keep writing!

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