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Dec-29-10
 | | Domdaniel: <Niels> Dank u, dank u ... and of course a LOQL is much better than the other thing. Een bankstel? Is 'couch' the right word? Something well-cushioned and plump, anyhoo, I s'pose. Dunno why, but I find furniture funny. |
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| Dec-29-10 | | achieve: <Dom> Quite so...
Not to put too fine a point on it, but furniture does not move by itself, indeed similar to a 'couch', which makes your translation quite brilliant. As opposed to: "When [she] enters, she lights up the entire room." I do enjoy my share of deeply dark humor, much as I attempt to hide it. Of course it's all quick connections I'm barely if not aware of that had me cracked up. This attempt at shining a "light" on it is nothing but utterly pathetic. My kind of funny. Mr J.A. Hide
quite |
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Dec-29-10
| | Domdaniel: <Niels> -- < furniture does not move by itself>
Quite. Or so it is generally believed. Yet Mr John Cale's exquis song 'Chinese Envoy' contains the lines ... <Calling out her name/
You'd be surprised at what came/
Galloping out of the darkness/
Just like furniture ...>
... and one time I heard him play it, saying something about it being an incident from a story by De Maupassant. Which is where my trail grows cold. |
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| Dec-29-10 | | achieve: <Dom> Very good point, since differing shades of darkness/light bring out shapes and forms like nothing else. Appearance and movement. John Cale is one talented writer.
Perhaps as good as you if he dropped the music thing. Ok, back to a little more serious, but I was thinking this afternoon that the apparent restrictions (writing song lyrics) rhyme and meter dictate in the end oddly enough encourage creativity, and provide enormous freedom. Allowing short-cuts and sharp twists. |
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| Dec-29-10 | | dakgootje: <N> Do you ever use, for instance, 'Mijn lieve/liefste Pietje' without your tongue fairly firmly in your cheek? Obviously 'my dear Watson' is not such - though perhaps you use the former without a cheeky tongue. In which case it might be due to some generation conflict.. hehehehe ;) There may be an exception for 'lieve schat' although even then people would look at your quite strangely. Translator seems like a mighty hard job though. |
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| Dec-29-10 | | achieve: <Dak> You're right, and I was goofing about a bit, although I *did* explicitly mention the "wink" that goes (ought to go) with it in Dutch, as opposed to in English (the Watson case), but I reckon it's depending on the situation as well. But you explained it in fine detail I thought, and just wanted to add a few things that sprung to mind, perhaps cause some confusion even... <Translator seems like a mighty hard job though.> One of the hardest, most challenging in the world! That's why I prefer to read books in the authentic language, in my case limited to German and English... French I think I would find a bit hard, but I'd very much enjoy it, as it is simply a beautiful language. |
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Dec-30-10
| | Domdaniel: <A Short History of Furniture in Popular Music, pt 2> "The furniture
Need not be rearranged
If it suits the way it is
There is no need for change"
Horslips, 1970s. Conservative sentiments for a 'rock' band, but they were trad-folkies at heart. |
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Dec-30-10
 | | OhioChessFan: <A Short History of Furniture in Popular Music, pt 2> "I'm a Rocker"
Original, of course: Chuck Berry
Refinished: Bruce Springsteen
Bashed to pieces: AC/DC
Chanted in: Judas Priest
Profaned: Lil Wayne |
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Dec-30-10
| | Domdaniel: <A Short History of Furniture in Popular Music, pt 3> "The Crickets are singing
The vesper bells ringing
The cat's curled asleep in a chair.
I'll go down to Bill's Bar
I can make it that far
And see if my friends are still there
And here's to the few
Who forgive what you do
And the fewer who don't even care..."
Leonard Cohen, drifting off topic as usual. |
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Dec-30-10
| | Domdaniel: <Ohio> Heh, thanks. I *finally* got it. According to a book I'm reading about the science of music (yep, us scientophiles can't even leave *that* alone) ... the song <Ohio> by the Pretenders has "a great groove". This is a technical quality but it does make you, technically, *groovy*. |
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| Dec-30-10 | | izimbra: <achieve>,<Domdaniel> In many European languages the word used for the same concept as "furniture" in English is derived from 'movable' instead of 'furnished' - e.g. moebel in German and meubles in French. Perhaps "Chinese Envoy" is related to the de Maupassant story called "Miss Harriet". |
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Dec-30-10
 | | Annie K.: <Dom> I looked up that Cohen song last time you posted a lyrics fragment from it. It's... uncannily on my wavelength. |
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Dec-30-10
| | Domdaniel: <Annie> So intended.
;) |
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Dec-30-10
| | Domdaniel: <izimbra> Thanks ... I thought I'd read most of de Maupassant's stories, either in French or English, but I missed that one. I trust it's a movable feast. |
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| Dec-30-10 | | achieve: <izimbra> Quite some information! Of course 'ammeublement', 'mobil-air' ... mobile, movable
<Ohio> I got the <Rocker> reference on a second reading... Still one of the all time great duets imo is Jack Teagarden teaming up with Louis Armstrong in the classic "Old Rockin' Chair" ... That's some seriously dated stuff, indeed, but very powerful... also, I am quite fond of the Cohen lyric Dom posted. What and <where> would we be "without our props!?" |
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| Dec-30-10 | | achieve: Ah yes, perhaps it's "cannily" on our wavelength. |
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| Dec-30-10 | | izimbra: <Domdaniel> Miss Harriet is really just a guess. The story features a repressed lady (incorrectly pegged wrt her movability), a runaway horse, and a different dude named Richelieu. http://www.classicreader.com/book/4...
No French and Germans fighting though - de Maupassant has other stories with that feature. What exactly Cale may really have had in mind is definitely above my medication grade. |
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Dec-30-10
| | Domdaniel: <izimbra> It must be Miss Harriet -- although probably not in any kind of literal version. Cale also wrote a song called Hedda Gabler - not a retelling of the play, despite some echoes; and another called Cable Hogue, which had little in common with the Peckinpah western of that name. But 'Chinese Envoy' continues
"We'd have lost it all
If it hadn't been for Cardinal Richelieu ..."
Which is good enough pour moi. |
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Dec-30-10
| | Domdaniel: Or perhaps not. Might there be *another* story, one in which les meubles go walkabout? I enjoyed Miss Harriet, though. These artist Johnnies, for all their louche boho manners and their comical French sense of superiority, possess *some* class of a soul. |
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Dec-30-10
| | Annie K.: Hmm... I didn't know that one by de Maupassant either, and I've read quite a bit by him too - short story collections. Guess Miss Harriet was not a favorite of the Hungarian editors. |
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| Dec-30-10 | | izimbra: Chinese Envoy also features the matching line "a master of nothing, a mistress of something, she thought." Clearly, interpreting de Maupassant is not so hard, while interpreting de Liberately ob Scure is an open-ended problem. |
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Dec-30-10
| | OhioChessFan: <Heh, thanks. I *finally* got it.> I've had a couple of never gots lately. I comfort myself by pretending <someone> got it and just didn't happen to post a response. |
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Dec-30-10
| | Domdaniel: <izimbra> Maybe you can interpret DeMau en passant, but some of us have to take things where they are. Unless they're in China. There are envoys for that kind of thing. |
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| Dec-30-10 | | izimbra: <Domdaniel> I meant that Cale is being deliberately obscure, not really wanting us to get any exact meaning or match. So it's not possible to have strong confidence in any suggested fit. |
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Dec-31-10
| | Annie K.: <Dom> Happy New Year, sweet! :) <Ohio> I got a bunch of yours, ackshly. ;) Happy New Year! |
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