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Hi all,
Here's a french jazz song.
My friend, Christian Braut, is the singer.

https://soundcloud.com/christian-devienne/victoire

Lyrics translation :

Her name was Victoire
But she was my defeat
I sing to her glory
She was perfect
Superfluous
Would be remorse
I drink at the counter
Some glasses of strong alcohol

And on the sidewalk
I smoke cigarettes
Hoping to see her
On her bicycle
Sometimes my memory
Comes and teases me
Then I manage to
Imagine her

For the anecdot
It's been a long time
That Victoire died
On her bicycle
Since that dirty night
There’s in my head
A great despair
A lifelong pain

My initial reaction is to laugh... But I can't tell if that was supposed to be funny.

Something may be lost in translation

Hi Japov,
I find curious to laugh at somebody's death!
I hope that's because the translation isn't good enough...

This was an interesting jazz piece for sure--very classic 50's - 60's jazz vibe. I find it enjoyable hearing the French language and have always thought "phonetically" the most beautiful language spoken. I got your translation okay..........I think from an American perspective when we hear this music vibe, we don't find it feeling sad, rather, "cool baby, cool!" From that perspective with music vibe, it doesn't pull on our heartstrings as feeling sad, rather we want to snap our fingers to the beat with jazz--could be different in France however.

We had a 16 year old French girl stay with one summer a few years ago as an exchange student in which we tutored her (part of our responsibility) with English. She got a kick out of how humor was different here, especially with idioms that we used for descriptions etc.(I used an example in the previous sentence and didn't even realize it........"kick." (used as meaning funny), but we know that is an grammar-wise incorrect!

I enjoyed your song, felt as if I were in a smokey nightclub hearing a very good singer as well!

steady-eddie

J'ai pensé qu'il pourrait être intéressant pour vous que google/translate vous le renvoie en français, pour voir si cette "technologie" répond correctement à ce que vous avez écrit.

La tragédie est rarement un sujet à chanter avec plaisir ou à entendre chanter. Nous avons tous nos propres tragédies. Si cela est réellement arrivé à quelqu'un, cela peut être un hommage que vous ne voulez pas changer.
Si c'est de la fiction, je préfère de loin évoquer en imagination, Victoire toujours sur son vélo, un Personnage Intérêt Amoureux, inspirant toujours le désir du Personnage-Chanteur.
Une fois, j'ai écrit les paroles d'une rupture amoureuse avec une phrase sur "les enfants", et j'ai fait remarquer à l'auteure-compositrice Laura Wood que je regrettais d'avoir inclus des enfants dans la "tragédie" d'un amant perdu.
"Sortez-les !" elle a immédiatement analysé. Elle savait que c'était une fiction. Et en tant qu'« auteur » de fiction, le fantasme du fantasme, nous pouvons faire ce que nous voulons de nos mots, les personnages de nos fantasmes. Au lieu de "Mettez votre manteau sur le lit. Les enfants jouent dehors." Je chante : « Pose ton manteau sur le lit. Nous ne jouerons pas ! ce qui est plus conforme au "contrôle" de la situation par le personnage d'intérêt amoureux alors que le personnage-chanteur se rend compte, "C'est fini! Fini et fini!" Le changement a tenu les enfants hors de l'équation. Le lit était simplement un porte-manteau, pas un endroit sur lequel il pouvait s'attendre à tomber avec passion.

Pouvez-vous faire revivre Victoire, la ramener à la vie, la belle fille, de jolies jambes pompant son vélo, un sourire à faire rêver un homme ?
Même s'il s'agit d'un véritable drame, si vous voulez offrir Victoire à d'autres, j'aimerais lui offrir avec toute la vie qui a suscité votre intérêt à l'origine.

I thought it might be interesting for you to have google/translate send it back to you in French, to see if that 'technology' gets it right as you wrote it.

Tragedy is seldom a matter to sing about with pleasure, or to hear sung about. We all have our own tragedies. If this actually happened to someone it may be a tribute you don't want to change.
If it is fiction, I'd much rather conjure in imagination, Victoire still on her bicycle, a Love-Interest Character, still inspiring the Singer-Character's desire.
I once wrote a Lyric of a romantic breakup with a line about 'the kids', and commented to Song-Writer Laura Wood that I regretted including children in the 'tragedy' of a lost lover.
"Take them out!" she immediately analyzed. She knew it was a fiction. And as the 'author' of fiction, the fantasizer of the fantasy, we can do whatever we like with our words, the Characters in our fantasies. Instead of "Lay your coat on the bed. The kids are out playing." I sing, "Lay your coat on the bed. We won't be playing!" which is more in keeping with the Love-Interest Character's 'control' of the situation as the Singer-Character realizes, "It's Over! Over And Done!" The change kept children out of the equation. The bed was simply a coat rack, not a place he could expect to tumble down on in passion.

Can you revive Victoire, bring her back to life, the beautiful girl, lovely legs pumping her bicycle, a smile to make a man dream?
Even if this is a real tragedy, if you want to offer Victoire to others, I'd like to offer her with all the life that originally inspired your interest.

Elle s'appelait Victoire
Mais elle était ma défaite
je chante à sa gloire
Elle était parfaite
Superflu
Serait le remords
je bois au comptoir
Quelques verres d'alcool fort

Et sur le trottoir
je fume des cigarettes
En espérant la voir
Sur son vélo
Parfois ma mémoire
Vient et me taquine
Ensuite j'arrive à
Imaginez-la

Pour l'anecdote
Ça fait longtemps
Que Victoire est morte
Sur son vélo
Depuis cette sale nuit
Il y a dans ma tête
Un grand désespoir
Une douleur à vie

Thanks Eddie and Gary for your detailed comments.
Perhaps, french and american languages aren't understood in the same way.
Here's the translation of a poem from Arthur Rimbaud, a wellknown french poet.

The Sleeper of the Valley

It is a hole of greenery where sings a river,
madly clinging to the grasses of silver rags
Of silver; where the sun, from the proud mountain,
Gleams: it is a small valley which foams with rays.

A young soldier, mouth open, head naked,
And his neck bathed in the fresh blue watercress,
Sleeps; he lies in the grass, under the cloud,
Pale in his green bed where the light rains.

With his feet in the gladioli, he sleeps. Smiling like a sick child
A sick child would smile, he snoozes:
Nature, rock him warmly: he is cold.

Perfumes do not make his nostrils tingle;
He sleeps in the sun, his hand on his chest,
Quiet. He has two red holes on his right side.


Do you find this poem funny ?

This is a very eloquent description of a soldier's death; While, ironically, surrounded by the beauty of life...

However,

In your poem, set to lively jazz, the sudden unexpected punch-line is...

"It's been a long time
That Victoire died
On her bicycle"

My mind immediately conjures an ironically comedic female character in love. Who, perhaps after her first kiss, rides off in a "smiling daze" on her bicycle... and gets hit by a truck.

Please don't think that I'm just being crass my friend... I'm just being honest about how your presentation effected me

Oh, and, sorry for your loss...

I know nothing about the French language or songs or the cultural predispositions of the French towards their language and music.
But I think that maybe...the French translation into (American) English triggers some very different cultural sensibilities than what is originally intended.

I'm afraid that to my sensibilities the translation arrives with incohesiveness in English.
Additionally, the song seems to be a form of quiet lamentation about a death. In American culture death is taken hard and seriously most of the time.

All of the above is one person's opinion about a possible conclusion. Disregard at will.


Martin

I enjoyed the music but I have to say it doesn't really seem to fit with the sentiment of the lyric. The arrangement is jaunty. It's bouncy. It would certainly fit with the picture of a beautiful girl on a bicycle but "a great despair, a lifelong pain?" I speak French, so I don't think the problem is in the translation. The music is good. The lyric is good. The combination is not so good in my opinion.

Her name was Victoire
But she was my defeat
I sing to her glory
She was perfect
Superfluous
Would be remorse
I drink at the counter
Some glasses of strong alcohol

or

Her name was Victoria
She was the end of me in many ways.
Yet I sing about her glory
She was perfect
Overwhelmingly so.
I drink to her memory as I lean on this bar
The whiskey need be strong to kill the pain of her loss.