un contre-temps

17:40 Feb 5, 2014 

Apologies Tony, I didn't meant anything naughty.... Would "beat off chronology" work better then, or is it definitely a no-no?

17:20 Feb 5, 2014 

Not quite sure I like what you're insinuating there... ;-)

But with Virgin, it's OK! ;-)

Also, linguistically, used as an inseparable transitive verb, with the object 'stiff competition' following, it works better than when you separate it and put the object in between.

17:09 Feb 5, 2014 

You, for sure, know better than me Tony...
I thought I was safe when I read 'Virgin Airlines must beat off stiff competition to win the contract.
Stiff on top of that.... !-)

16:21 Feb 5, 2014 

Haha, I would have to concur with Tony, beating off might make a number of readers uncomfortable, even unconsciously.
Clearly not as bad as Panasonic's "Touch Woody -- the Internet Pecker." but still. :D

15:59 Feb 5, 2014 

Certainly NOT, I'm afraid!!! 'to beat off' has a slang meaning which would be MOST unwelcome in this context ;-)

15:56 Feb 5, 2014 

why not (keeping most of your own words)
"This off-beat is a réaction which beats chronology off and underscores a hiatus: this is a perforated mesh rather than a fabric of history."

13:59 Feb 5, 2014 

Unless you can come up with something else in the next 4 hours :-) What a fun game!

13:58 Feb 5, 2014 

All of you would get A+ I'm sure for your analyses ;-) Don't be surprised that this is geography: the professor writing this is from the French School of geography which is very theoretical and philosophical as you probably know. He is also quite poetic in his writing and, as is typically French, likes to provoke. I think patrickfor and Tony M were the closest to grasping the sense. My first translation was "This interval is a reaction which demolishes chronology and underscores a hiatus: a perforated mesh rather than a fabric of history. ", however I like your more literal, pictorial translation of contre-temps as a hiccup or off-beat. I think that is what the author intended: a space that throws you a little off-balance while surveying the images of the maps, especially since in this case they're constantly being re-arranged. Thank you for the discussion :-D (y)

09:52 Feb 5, 2014 

Asker's context, not given in the question, but added at the bottom of this discussion thread, doesn't exactly make it clear, but I know from her original question that it is discussing the white space found between maps on the pages of an atlas — in other words, it seems to be about the little 'jolt' the reader gets when reading across a map and having to hop across to the next page...

09:33 Feb 5, 2014 

I am very puzzled by your defining this as "Geography / Cartography" and associating it with the weather, as it seems far more philosophical, possibly philosophy of history. So far, Patrick's reading of it seems, to me, to be the most satisfactory.

06:08 Feb 5, 2014 

Hmmm, however it is directly associated to chronologie, so it is temporal. :) je ne sais pas, ce genre de texte pose toujours le problème de traduire mot pour mot ou de s'en éloigner un peu pour garder l'effet poétique.

22:22 Feb 4, 2014 

In french... Non Philippe je ne crois pas qu'il s'agisse de délai, on ne dirait pas un contretemps qui est quelque chose d’imprévu, ici on sait bien qu'il y a un délai entre les images. C'est une autre histoire qui s’inscrit à contretemps, en contrepoint de ce que montrent les images. A contretemps (le temps faible) puisque justement on n'a pas d'image. Quelque chose qui remet en cause la chronologie, qui installe de la distance qui fait se rendre compte qu'on n'a pas une vue continue (le tissu) mais un maillage qui comporte plus de trous qu'autre chose.
Bien entendu ce n'est que mon interpretation, peut-être faudrait-il encore plus de contexte pour être sûr.... Mais j'ai du mal a imaginer qu'on puisse parler de "contretemps=retard inattendu) et le fait d'écrire contre-temps (avec un tiret) me semble bien être une manière d'expliciter tout ca... Contre-temps a rapprocher (dans l'écriture) de contre-emploi, contre-indiquer etc.... dans le sens donc de l'opposé de...

20:01 Feb 4, 2014 

...it's just saying that the white space between pages interrupts your reading across the maps? A kind of 'saut de lecture' or in EN perhaps a hiccup?

19:55 Feb 4, 2014 

Very loosely translated, my understanding is that "That interval is an unwanted delay that weakens the chronology and set the fault: a hole in a net rather than the expected fabric of history" . It is like if instead of the small delay, small gap expected between 2 thread you now have a much larger hole due to this unexpected delay.

19:38 Feb 4, 2014 

@mathieu avant de voir la bonne trad (effectivement les natifs sont les mieux placés) j'ai l'impression que c'est l'expression française qui n'est pas assimilée.... Cette phrase lève les ambiguïtés il me semble:
"Cet intervalle est un contre-temps qui bat en brèche la chronologie et inscrit le hiatus"....
Oui c'est un contretemps (décalé)) ou un contrepoint (qui donne une autre vision)

19:30 Feb 4, 2014 

Oui! Besides contretemps does not "asverse weather" in french.... contretemps is either a delay (je suis en retard, j'ai eu un contretemps") or an off-beat in the musical sense.

19:23 Feb 4, 2014 

J'ai l'impression qu'ici "contre-temps" signifie un temps alternatif, en écho à contre-courant, ou plutôt même à contrepoint (en musique). Dans ces cas-là, essayer d'être plus littéral peut être une sage solution, sur le principe. Mais je laisse le soin aux natifs de formuler des suggestions.

17:55 Feb 4, 2014 

Rather than throwing your question out to see what we come up with, which can have us all going round on a wild goose chase, it is more productive if you tell us what solutions you are already considering, your thinking about those, and maybe the reasons why you may have rejected any of them.

17:49 Feb 4, 2014 

I do know that there are many more choices than 'adverse weather conditions', for example, in fencing the appropriate term would be counter-time, however this isn't fencing. I know what my own "best choice" is so far, but I wanted to throw out this challenging sentence to see what you would make of it.

17:47 Feb 4, 2014 

That's a big help!

17:45 Feb 4, 2014 

Here are the three sentences surrounding it. It is in a sentence at the end of a paragraph:

C’est l’intervalle, l’entre qui devient le lieu, le milieu des images réunies. C’est-à-dire les relations éphémères, les associations cognitives et imaginatives. Cet intervalle est un contre-temps qui bat en brèche la chronologie et inscrit le hiatus : le maillage troué plutôt que le tissu de l’histoire.

17:45 Feb 4, 2014 

Do note that 'contretemps' doesn't only — indeed, normally — mean 'adverse weather'! It has the sense of 'contretemps' in EN too, or a hitch, etc., which then makes a lot more sense in your overall context.