Return to Algiers

First there was the Battle of Algiers:



"La France doit-elle rester en Algèrie?"

"Si vous rèpondez encore oui, vous devez en accepter toutes les consèquences nècessaires."


30 years later:

Some translations

A well translated poem looks something like this. I take as an example the foreword to the Romance of the Three Kingdoms by Luo Guanzhong, as translated from the Chinese by Moss Roberts:

滚滚长江东逝水，浪花淘尽英雄。是非成败转头空。
青山依旧在，几度夕阳红。
白发渔樵江渚上，惯看秋月春风。一壶浊酒喜相逢。
古今多少事，都付笑谈中。
　　　　　　　　　　　　　　——调寄《临江仙》

On and on the Great River rolls, racing east.
Of proud and gallant heroes its white-tops leave no trace,
As right and wrong, pride and fall turn all at once unreal.
Yet ever the green hills stay
To blaze in the west-waning day.

Fishers and woodsmen comb the river isles.
White-crowned, they've seen enough of spring and autumn tide
To make good company over the wine jar,
Where many a famed event
Provides their merriment.

                                                         - From ershiwu shi tanci

Moss attributes the authorship of the poem to a collection of works "ershiwu shi tanci" (二十五史弹词??)  rather than specifically to 调寄《临江仙》.It is interesting in that this provides a wider context for people unfamiliar the genre (or the language).

A search into "ershiwu shi tanci" reveals that it is "a collection of popular songs on historical themes compiled during the Ming dynasty by Yang Shen (d. 1559)". Personally I had to look up what 调寄 means.

Alas, poor Simone

"Drama of my affections, pathos of life . . . . Indeed, I have a more complicated, more nuanced sensibility than his and a more exhausting power of love. Those problems that he lives in his mind, I live them with my arms and my legs. Has he ever known months when all the days were only tears? I do not want to lose all that . . . . Only I must make myself stronger in order to walk on despite my burden. Two cowardly attitudes: keep the burden and sit down - (this is very cowardly) - throw off the burden and walk on. One good one: keep the burden and walk on. I will walk on."