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état providence
côté l’enthousiasme
Nov 15, 2012 21:24
11 yrs ago
français term

Si tu savais combien je t'ai manqué

Non-PRO français vers anglais Art / Littérature Général / conversation / salutations / correspondance Song lyric
I am having problems translating (Or even understanding) this line in a lyric.
The song is Terre, by french lyricist Eric Benzi.

I learned in school, manquer translates as "to be missed (by)", tu me manques - I miss you. glossed - you are missed by me.
Therefore "je t'ai manque" "you missed me" I was missed by you.
But when added to "tu savais", I get:

If you knew how much you missed me.
Which makes no sense at all, since of all the people in the world who might know how much you missed me, would be you. I would also understand it if there were a future tense or conditional "If you would have known how much you were going to miss me" (then you might not have loved me...hah!)

Anyhow, I am unsure if there is a word play here, or i'm just being dumb.

full lyrics (for context if it matters) can be found here:
http://lyrics.filestube.com/song/357848fdcd62fbe903ea,Terre....

(english answer preferred but french is fine, too)
Proposed translations (anglais)
5 +8 If you knew how much you've missed me
4 If you knew how many times I've just missed you
3 -1 If you knew how much I've missed you
2 If you only knew how lost I was (without you)
4 -3 If you knew how much I've missed you
Change log

Nov 16, 2012 08:59: writeaway changed "Field (specific)" from "Musique" to "Général / conversation / salutations / correspondance"

Discussion

David Vaughn Nov 18, 2012:
"Do we know if Dion's French albums were widely distributed outside of Canada"

Dion sells more records in France than in Canada, and the difference is even more important if you exclude the English-language records.
David Vaughn Nov 18, 2012:
Texan Québécois If a French speaker from Quebec wants to step in, it would be appreciated.

The link mentioned is written by someone in Texas, talking about "some parts of Quebec", quite likely those parts where people don't speak French as a native. It is a single post which finds no echo in the thread. The other link refers to use of "on manque", not exactly probative to less ambiguous pronouns. ("On" is popularly used to replace every single other pronoun.)

While singers may sometimes use popular "grammar", such as omitting the "ne" in "ne-pas" phrases, I don't see them getting confused about the meaning of "manquer", and especially not confusing it with a pseudo-anglicism which is transparently incorrect. Only an anglophone can make this mistake. But I suppose a hip native speaker might find it cool to imitate an anglophone. Michael Jackson is Bad.
David Vaughn Nov 18, 2012:
Texan Québécois If a French speaker from Quebec wants to step in, it would be appreciated.

The link mentioned is written by someone in Texas, talking about "some parts of Quebec", quite likely those parts where people don't speak French as a native. It is a single post which finds no echo in the thread. The other link refers to use of "on manque", not exactly probative to less ambiguous pronouns. ("On" is popularly used to replace every single other pronoun.)

While singers may sometimes use popular "grammar", such as omitting the "ne" in "ne-pas" phrases, I don't see them getting confused about the meaning of "manquer", and especially not confusing it with a pseudo-anglicism which is transparently incorrect. Only an anglophone can make this mistake. But I suppose a hip native speaker might find it cool to imitate an anglophone. Michael Jackson is Bad.
Wolf Draeger Nov 18, 2012:
@kipruss I guess that's quite possible. Do we know if Dion's French albums were widely distributed outside of Canada, or aimed specifically at a Canadian audience?
kipruss3 (asker) Nov 17, 2012:
Manquer in Quebec So I still was curious about this, and have been googling. I've found two sources that suggest that in Quebec, "manquer" has picked up the ENGLISH sense of "to miss" rather than "to be missed by" that it has correctly in french.

So much so that one is advised to avoid manquer at all, when in quebec and use something like ennuier.

http://forum.wordreference.com/showthread.php?t=572388
User "Albert 50" about halfway down makes the comment.

and here: http://www.drorlist.com/textes/EQ.html - the author suggsts that On te manque = Tu nous manque .

Since benzi is writing for Dion, maybe he used a quebecoise expression, rather than a propper "french" one.

Again, my french level is 3 years college, so not really fluent at all... just looking for answers. hehe
Wolf Draeger Nov 17, 2012:
@David I'm not disputing that the phrase can be used as you suggest, only that it's unlikely in this context. You raise a good point about the appropriateness of correcting perceived errors during translation, though.

You're quite right about the poetic effect of contradiction, but it needs to make sense in order to be effective.

As for the quality control process, well, even the best among us make mistakes; it's hard to say in this case. Maybe someone can volunteer to contact the songwriter to find out what he meant :-)
David Vaughn Nov 17, 2012:
The subtitle of the song is "s'il suffisait d'aimer". If you take the lyrics at face value, with "terre" referring only to the mother earth, which I think is short of the mark poetically, obviously a planet can't think anything. But as I pointed out elsewhere, there is nothing bizarre about the idea that someone doesn't know what they are really feeling.

But regardless, if an author asks me to translate "all black telephones are multicoloured", I don't change the meaning because it doesn't add up.

Songwriters (like publicity copy writers) use "hooks". One well known technique is to use something that seems contradictory. It means people pay more attention. "Je T'Aime, Moi Non Plus" was quite intentional.

With "Terre" we have a world-famous lyricist, apparently writing for a world-famous singer, with world famous management, in the context of multi-million contracts. I am certain the text was vetted.
Wolf Draeger Nov 17, 2012:
Context/meaning @ David: have you actually read the lyrics? I don't see how "if you only knew how much you've missed me" fits in the song; it just doesn't make sense.

The songwriter is indeed renowned, which adds to the puzzle; how could he make such an obvious mistake? Perhaps you're right and the wording is intentional (no error), but then there must be a different meaning no one has thought of yet.
David Vaughn Nov 16, 2012:
re: Grammar vs Context You need a better justification than "the author used incorrect grammar" when there is nothing incorrect about the grammar. No native French speaker could possibly confuse this question, and the author of the text is a very well known and experienced lyricist. There is no room for ambiguity in the precision of the language. Any translation which seeks to twist that precision is well off mark.
Wolf Draeger Nov 16, 2012:
Grammar vs Context Looking at the song's lyrics, it seems the writer meant to say "you don't know how much I've missed you", but used incorrect grammar for some reason. I agree "...you've missed me" is what "...tu m'as manqué" means grammatically, but it's hard to see how that would work in this context (as Asker points out). So I would actually translate it as "...I've missed you", because that's what appears to be meant (which is more important than what is said). Correcting the French here would end up changing the meaning of the lyric.
David Vaughn Nov 16, 2012:
Contradiction While I agree that the poetic interest of the phrase is mostly in its apparent self-contradiction, I think that much of the various theories of psychology is based on the concept that someone else may be able to discern your real or subconscious feelings and motivations better than you can. There is no actual contradiction in the phrase.
Colin Morley (X) Nov 16, 2012:
Thanks Tony I'm eternally grateful. It would seem that in common with others I had not encountered this in translation and genuinely didn't realise that the French usage was "reversed" (Clearly I don't get enough social interaction!) A very useful piece of advice which I shall try to keep to the forefront of my ever-diminishing memory.
Tony M Nov 16, 2012:
manquer I've always found a helpful way of remembering how 'manquer' is used in FR is to bear in mind its underlying meaning, which is 'to lack / be lacking' — so 'tu me manques' comes out as 'you are lacking to me', hence 'I miss you'.

Proposed translations

+8
12 minutes
français term (edited): Si tu savais combien je t\'ai manqué
Selected

If you knew how much you've missed me

;-))

You're right. It's an idea to think about. But it can make sense.
Peer comment(s):
agree Tony M : Yes, especially if you translated the 'savais' by 'realized'... and added 'just how much...'
2 minutes
Thanks Tony. Or "if only you realized". But do see the lyrics of the song, which do seem to make it a bit more weird.
agree Tristan Jimenez
35 minutes
agree Mark Bossanyi
53 minutes
agree Cyril B.
4 heures
agree Daryo : deliberate use of a logical contradiction, that's very "original"; already done in 1969 - “Je t'aime… moi non plus" [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Je_t'aime..._moi_non_plus]
7 heures
agree Robin Salmon (X) : As Tony says, "realized" is a helpful translation of "savais".
10 heures
agree FoundInTrans
10 heures
agree Emma Paulay
12 heures
disagree Josephine Cassar : that is literal translation but not according to text either
12 heures
agree sofi21 : realize or if only you knew
23 heures
Something went wrong...
4 KudoZ points awarded for this answer. Comment: "thanks all"
-3
37 minutes

If you knew how much I've missed you

Je te manque - I miss you...
Isn't it logical???
Peer comment(s):
disagree trsk2000 (X) : Tu me manques is I miss you
5 minutes
OK, you are right.
disagree Tristan Jimenez : sorry but it's the opposite in French..
9 minutes
Yes, I realize that now.
neutral Daryo : the ST is deliberately not logical.
6 heures
OK, I already acknowledge my mistake...
disagree Tony M : Asker has already explained that they understand the way 'manquer' is used in FR, which is the opposite of this.
7 heures
Idem idem
Something went wrong...
12 heures

If you knew how many times I've just missed you

Manquer can also be translated as "to miss" as in missing a target or a train, explained in the link below as "ne pas atteindre, ne pas voir". As the singer is following a trail leading, she hopes, to her lost love, with inadequate clues and no compass, this would fit the context very well I believe.
Reference:

http://www.wordreference.com/fren/manquer

Peer comment(s):
disagree Emma Paulay : Nice idea, but it isn't what the text says
33 minutes
agree Wolf Draeger : Or "if you only knew how close, yet how far I was from you"?
1 jour 3 heures
Thanks Wolf - yes, we have the commonly-used saying "I was so near and yet so far"!
Something went wrong...
-1
13 heures

If you knew how much I've missed you

You cannot know that the person has missed you, you can only know how much you yourself missed someone. Manquer(to miss) is used differently in French. I do not suppose because in a lyric, it is different

--------------------------------------------------
Note added at 13 hrs (2012-11-16 10:33:19 GMT)
--------------------------------------------------

Because she did not go there probably according to text in lyric
Peer comment(s):
neutral David Vaughn : Exactly the same answer was given 12 hours before.
16 minutes
disagree Daryo : "You cannot know that the person has missed you" true, but here it's said like that on purpose. It’s a way of saying "I know better than you do if you missed me or not"
4 heures
Something went wrong...
1 jour 16 heures

If you only knew how lost I was (without you)

A long shot, but maybe worth an answer. My initial thought was (and largely still is) that the songwriter made a mistake, and should have used "...combien tu m'as manqué". Only he knows.

Then I started thinking about the "miss the target" (rater) or "miss the train" meaning of manquer, and how it can be used transitively when referring to an object. So, what if the writer meant to convey how far away s/he is from the earth (metaphorical lover), how wide off the mark s/he was (note the subsequent reference to a compass), in other words, how lost s/he was?

Perhaps the choice of wording is a play on words in an attempt to convey the sense of being lost and missing the earth/one's lover, in which case it's either a clever pun or too clever by half; let the reader decide :-)

Or David could be right (as he is grammatically, of course), but I just can't reconcile a literal translation with the song's meaning and context, at least as I understand them.

Petit Robert, Manquer:
Ne pas rencontrer; laisser échapper, laisser perder; être absent.
Something went wrong...
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