Les trompettes de la renommée [English translation]

1 I lived apart from the public eye

Serene, contemplative, sombre, bucolic... 2

Refusing to hand over the ransom asked for fame

On my sprig of laurel I would sleep dormouse like 3

People of good counsel were able to make me see

That to the man in the street, I had some debts to pay

And that, on pain of falling in complete oblivion,

I must bring into the open all my little secrets

{Chorus :}

Trumpets

Of Goddess Fame,

You make

A most discordant din ! 4

Flouting the most elementary modesty

Must I, for the needs of the publicist’s cause,

Divulge with whom and in what position

I plunge into debauchery and fornication?

If I publish names, how many Penelopes 5

Will be seen straightaway as the most arrant whores

How many good friends will give me funny looks ?

How many revolver shots will hit their mark on me!

Public display makes my nature ill at ease,

Suffering from modesty that’s almost unhealthy.

I do not show my reproductive organs

To anyone, except my women and my doctors.

Must I, to be headline news in gossip columns,6

Drum up attention with my genitals as sticks.7

Must I raise them on high more ostensibly

As a choir boy carries the holy sacrament.

A woman of society, who often gives me

Free rein to voluptuous joys 8 in her noble quarters

On the quiet passed on, upon her silken couch,

Parasites of the basest kind that be...

Under the pretext of sensation, under the heading of publicity

Have I the right to tarnish the honour of this lady?

En criant sur les toits, et sur l'air des lampions 9 :

By shouting from the rooftops and chanting the catchphrase : “Madame la Marquise has given me her crabs!”? 10

Heaven indeed be praised, I live on the best of terms,

With le père Duval,11 the singing skullcap,

He the catechumen,12 I the non-conforming man,

He lets me say “Shit!”, I let him say “Amen”,

With his approval, must I write then in the press

That one evening I surprised him at the knees of my mistress,

Singing a murmured chant in a slushing voice, 13

The while she searched for him the fleas in his bald patch ? 14

So with whom, ventrebleu ! Must I go to bed

To provoke a bit the goddess with hundred mouths ?

Must a woman who is a celebrity, a star 15

Come to take in my arms the place of my guitar?

To excite the people and the gutter press.

Who is willing to lend me her much fancied butt?

Who is willing to let me, not wearing a stitch,

Have a bit of a scramble on her mount of Venus

Would these trumpets of the Gods ring out more loud

If, like each and everyone, I was a bit that way, 16

If I swayed my hips more like a young woman

And suddenly took on a gazelle like grace

But I’m not aware that these jokers gain at all,

From playing the game of love by inverting the roles,

That this would add one ounce more merit to my name. 17

The crime of same sex love, today, no longer pays.18

After this review of the thousand and one smart tricks

Which are certain to earn the honours of the press

I prefer to keep to my first way of doing things

And scratch my stomach, as ever, while singing songs

If the public wants, I bring them out quick time.

If not, I put them all back into my guitar,

Refusing to hand over the ransom asked for fame.

On my laurel sprig, I rest, sleeping like a dormouse

PHEME or OSSA was the goddess or spirit (daimon) of rumour, report and gossip. She was also, by extension, the dual spirit of fame and good repute in a positive sense, and infamy and scandal in the bad.

In Greek mythology, Pheme (Greek: Φήμη, Roman equivalent: Fama) was the personification of fame and renown, her favour being fame, her wrath being scandalous rumors.

2. Bucolic- Brassens saw himself at home in a pastoral setting in his song “Auprès de mon arbre”. (The adjective ‘bucolic’ is derived from the Greek word for herdsmen). By using this adjective, he reminds us that his attitude has a long, honourable tradition dating back to the poets of Greece and Rome.3. Je dormais comme un loir. There are two expressions based on “sleeping” in this line. Dormir comme un loir= to sleep like a dormouse. “S’endormir sur ses lauriers” to rest on one’s laurels.4. Trompettes… mal embouchées. Brassens is making a play on words. “Emboucher la trompette” is to put the trumpet to your lips to play – in this case wrongly. The idiom “Mal embouché » means speaking coarsely like the English to bad mouth.5. Pénélope was the faithful wife of Ulysses.6. défrayer la chronique = to be in the news- to be in the limelight7. Battre l' tambour. The translation of town crier is tambour de ville because a little drum was used to draw attention, where the English used a bell.8. Mes quat' voluptés : This is a play on words from the phrase « Laisser faire à quelqu’un ses quatre voluptés » = to leave some-one a free hand to do what they like. Alone, the plural noun “voluptés” means sensual pleasures. Ses quartiers refers to the quarters on her noble coat of arms, but has a double meaning.9. l'air des lampions : This is a chant made by a group of people, which should really be three syllables repeated on the same note. For example, where impatient English people will sing repeatedly the one line: “Why are we waiting?” the French will chant Com-men-cez.., Com-men-cez…. The chant here is shaped by the alliteration of four m sounds.10. morpions - are pubic lice11. le Père Duval - Brassens has just said that he should not be expected to reveal secrets of his friends and colleagues. In this verse, he does just that. Le Père Duval (1918- 1984) was a Jesuit priest, who was a gifted songwriter and solo guitarist. He appeared on the same stages as Georges Brassens and was sometimes known as Brassens in a cassock. He was very popular in the 1950s and 1960s and gave more than 3,000 concerts in 44 countries. Under the strain of his professional career he became an alcoholic and had great difficulty in overcoming this addiction. Brassens mischievously tells us he also had another weakness of the flesh.12. Catéchumène – As this means some-one who is receiving religious instruction it does not apply to a Jesuit priest , but Brassens likes the play on the word with “énergumène” which means a rowdy person.13. La mélopée means monotonous chant, Susurrer means to whisper. The onomatopoeia of the two French words perfectly conveys the action.14. This line is intended to give a description of the relative positions of the man and woman rather than give an exact explanation of their activity.15. une étoile, une star, - as the two words have the same meaning, one noun only is required in the translation.16. Tapette- Collins Robert tells us that this equates in English to « poof » or « queer ». I am reluctant to use this as the translation would, in contemporary political correctness, make him guilty of a hate crime. As an admirer of Brassens’ character, I am absolutely certain that he did not hate homosexuals. As he says in this same line, homosexuality is all around. A large number of the leading figures in entertainment and the arts were homosexual. At some concerts, the great French songwriter and singer, Charles Trenet was on the same bill as Brassens. What was different in those days was that homosexuality was a criminal offence. Brassens cynically tells those who might have him act as if he had such inclinations to arouse the clamour of the press, that homosexuality does not pay. It is true that Brassens had on some subjects strong feelings that could be represented by the unsympathetic as hatred, but these were directed at people with power who oppressed their fellows. Those vulnerable people he refers to in this verse do not come into that category.17. plus-value is a word used in commerce = increase in value, appreciation.18. Le crime pédérastique. In the 1950s the word pédéraste was used to describe a homosexual. The homosexual act was not decriminalised in France until the 4th August 1982.

• Artist:Georges Brassens
• Album:Les trompettes de la renommée