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Apr 18, 2011 09:46
13 yrs ago
French term

l'épars d'une trace

French to English Art/Literary Art, Arts & Crafts, Painting sculpture
I am translating a high-brow, poetic/dreamlike and very fanciful (i.e. incomprehensible!) text about a sculptor (XXXX) from the preface of a catalogue containing pictures of his work.

I´m struggling to decipher what "l'épars d'une trace" might mean in the below paragraph (I also don't really understand the use of "à" after the verb "ventiler", but that´s another matter. The entire sentence is totally obscure!!)

"De Trinidad ou d'Antigua, l'homme et la femme (le Couple antillais) sont ventilés **à l'epars d'une trace**, au profus d'un transplant, a l'incertain d'un discours; ils attendent de tourner les yeux. Avec XXXX en effet nous tournons notre face vers ce vent. Je veux dire qu'il nous donne l'energie. Oui. Qu'il revele en nous l'energie offusquée. XXXX est notre santé."

[NB: "le Couple antillais" is the name of one of the sculptor´s pieces]

My translation so far is, "From Trinidad and Antigua, the man and woman (the Couple antillais (West Indian Couple)) are separated by a ??scattered trace??, the abundance of a transplant and the uncertainty of discourse. " [what on earth is he going on about???!!!).

Thanks in advance for any help you can give! MUCH APPRECIATED!!!
Proposed translations (English)
5 dispersed by the winds and turned into a vestige
3 +1 with sparse lines
4 scattered to an abstraction
2 scattering or dispersal of a trace
Change log

Apr 18, 2011 09:46: changed "Kudoz queue" from "In queue" to "Public"

Apr 18, 2011 10:22: Stéphanie Soudais changed "Term asked" from "l\'épars (d\'une trace)" to "l\'épars d\'une trace"

Discussion

Dieezah May 1, 2011:
@ Clare I'm glad I could help. It's not often I get to see texts like that for translation purposes... I grew up with that kind of litterature and I never really thought of how challenging it could be for others to understand... I'm still there if you need more help....
Clare Hogg (asker) May 1, 2011:
Dieezah Thanks for your ongoing help with this tricky text. Really useful input and much appreciated! :-)
I like your translation of "ventilés" as "disperse" as it calls to mind the WIND, which is important given "ce vent" in the following sentence.
I still don´t really understand what "a l'epars d'une trace" is getting at: my instinct still tells me it refers to the "scattered (out)line" of the gap between the man and the woman in this sculpture, through which the wind/air can move/blow (hence "ventilé), maybe separating the two figures - this woudl tie in with your below explanation of people being dispersed all over the place during the period of slavery. What do you think?

Your explanation just below was very useful and your interpretation is probably better than any, so I´d like to award you the points for this. Can you please post an answer so I can do so? Thanks!
Dieezah Apr 25, 2011:
Thanks to your other posts... Thanks to your other posts and what they told me about your text, I can now tell you that :
To me, this sentenc is again hinting at the slave origins of Caribbean people... A l'épars d'une trace, basically what the writer meant was that men and women have been scattered "from Trinidad or Antigua" all over the Caribbean dispersed by the winds.... (I say it like that to make the meaning clearer in workable English but I leave it to you to coin a phrase that will remain faithful to the poetic style... )
Clare Hogg (asker) Apr 24, 2011:
sorry for not responding sooner... I felt like I was banging my head against the wall with this sentence and so decided to leave it for a few days. Now I have come back to it and read everyone´s great comments (THANK YOU VERY MUCH!!)...and I´m afraid I still don´t know how to translate this into meaningful English!

BTW - Yes, cc in nyc, I think this is the sculpture in question.

I wonder if "l'épars d'une trace" is referring to that hole between the male and female figure? It looks "scattered" in shape (i.e. not straight)....
cc in nyc Apr 23, 2011:
@ Clare Can you confirm that the text is referring to this sculpture?
http://www.christies.com/LotFinder/lot_details.aspx?intObjec...
cc in nyc Apr 19, 2011:
@ Petitavoine That's all I found, but Clare would be the one to confirm it. I certainly could be wrong!!!
Worse still, the longer I look at the French text, the less confident I am that I understand it. :o
Jocelyne Cuenin Apr 18, 2011:
C'est de cette statue dont on parle ? En effet, c'est droit comme on bâton, si c'est ventilé, c'est certainement par une petite brise rafraîchissante !
cc in nyc Apr 18, 2011:
@ Stéphanie I think Chevallet is on the right track; I think that "spare" works quite well here.
cc in nyc Apr 18, 2011:
Couple antillais A link to a photo of the sculpture is posted on my suggested answer.
IMO, it doesn't look very windy, but the two figures are definitely distinct. (BTW, nice price!)
Jocelyne Cuenin Apr 18, 2011:
Je cite Edouard Glissant pas Confiant, pardon
Jocelyne Cuenin Apr 18, 2011:
épars, adj = (dispersé ...) Mais aussi (vieux francais ?) l'épars est le bâton qui tient le pavillon (terme de marine) -> vent, mer -> j'ai cette image du couple qui se tient à la proue (ici, peut-être au pied du pavillon) comme K. Winslet dans le vent dans Titanic :-)

R. Confiant au sujet du créole :
Le langage des marins normands ou bretons se mêle, par une sorte de synthèse mystérieuse, aux syntaxes
de l’Afrique sub-saharienne pour donner une langue nouvelle.
Phoebe Green Apr 18, 2011:
Ventilés à l'épars I agree with Dieezah on the translation of "ventilé" as relating to wind, rather than separation, especially given "vers CE vent" later in the text. "Epars" seems to be an adjective used as a substantive, given the example of the other phrases ("PROFUS d'un transplant," "INCERTAIN d'un discours"). Looking at Cardenas' sculpture (good old Google Image!) with its very stripped-down outline, I'd say that "trace" means line, rather than the English "trace".

It's a very chewy assignment you've got there!
Stéphanie Soudais Apr 18, 2011:
Éclair ? As a French native speaker I find this sentence very obscure as well. Épars is usually found as an adj., not as a noun. However, see what I found in my 19th c. Larousse:
ÉPARS s. m. (de l'ancien français espars, éclair, de la vieille forme espardre, disperser, et aussi éclairer, du latin spargo. L'éclair est ainsi nommé parce qu'il disperse sa lumière dans le ciel. Cependant Chevallet préfère rapporter ce mot à l'anglo-saxon "spare", étincelle, au hollandais "sprank", "sprankie", au bas-allemand "spark", à l'anglais "spark", sans doute de la même racine que le latin spargo). Marit. Eclair qui n'est pas suivi d'un coup de tonnerre.
Helen Shiner Apr 18, 2011:
@ Clare In general terms, if I ever have to translate work of this nature, I generally ask for images of the works in question - really sometimes this makes it so much easier and saves the stabbing in the dark.
Helen Shiner Apr 18, 2011:
Sculptor What kind of work is this? Literally sculpture in the old-fashioned sense or an installation work (as sculpture so often is nowadays)? Might even have a video element, which for some reason is what springs to mind here. Don't ask me why.
Dieezah Apr 18, 2011:
I wouldn't take ventilés to mean separated but that's because I'm West-indian.... I would take it more in a "caressed by the breeze" sense... Still don't have a clue how to word it faithfully in English though..... at the scattering of a trace... Ok now that's weird, even for my poetic lyricist mind.... To me the whole paragraph seems to be about the origins of present day West-indians (slavery era) and the way men and women were parted by merchants... the uncertainty of promises made by masters that families would not be broken up (masters did rarely keep their promises).... Maybe that's my cultural background talking but that's what I perceive from this text....
Evans (X) Apr 18, 2011:
Clare, do you have access to images of this piece? If it were a painting I would suspect that trace here would be a line, but with a sculpture this is not so certain.

Proposed translations

3 hrs

scattering or dispersal of a trace

this is my humble suggestion
1-i take here " ventilés " as : exposé au vent de l'incertitude ( ou autre).ventilés à : comme exposés ou soumis à ....
2-the trace to follow is scattered , dispersed
alors ils vont lá où le vent les emmene , car la trace s'est dissipée




--------------------------------------------------
Note added at 3 hrs (2011-04-18 12:56:02 GMT)
--------------------------------------------------

épars dans ce texte , nom , pas adjectif

--------------------------------------------------
Note added at 3 hrs (2011-04-18 12:58:56 GMT)
--------------------------------------------------

De l’ancien français espars (« éclair »), espardre (« éclairer, disperser »), du latin spargere (« répandre »).

--------------------------------------------------
Note added at 3 hrs (2011-04-18 13:00:33 GMT)
--------------------------------------------------

(Marine) Petits éclairs qui ne sont pas suivis de coups de tonnerre.
Something went wrong...
+1
3 hrs

with sparse lines

Or "in sparse outline."

Here's a photo of the work:
http://www.christies.com/LotFinder/lot_details.aspx?intObjec...

--------------------------------------------------
Note added at 5 hrs (2011-04-18 15:33:22 GMT)
--------------------------------------------------

Oh, oh! I just reread Stéphanie's Discussion entry... Of course...

spare lines or spare outline :-))
Peer comment(s):
neutral Rachel Fell : very helpful to see the sculpture, sorry I haven't got time to answer more just now
7 hrs
Glad you like the photo. We can "chat" later...
agree Alexia Marie (X)
14 days
Thank you!
Something went wrong...
13 days
French term (edited): l\'épars d\'une trace

dispersed by the winds and turned into a vestige

From Trinidad or Antigua, man and woman (or man and wife, as you feel it, that's what I get from the title of the sculpture) are dispersed by the winds and turned into a vestige.
dispersed by the winds = ventilés à l'épars
and turned into a vestige =l'épars une trace (as in " you can tell they were here but they are no more, the only evidence that remains of their existence is a trace, children scattered all over the Caribbean")
Please see my web reference for the choice of vestige instead of trace...

Reference:

http://www.thefreedictionary.com/trace

Peer comment(s):
neutral cc in nyc : But the figures in the sculpture seem so unwindy and so aligned (just my impression). ;-) //
Thank you for your understanding!
6 mins
I know, but you've got to take the text as an artistic work of it's own, inspired by the sculpture, not an actual description... Because the person who wrote it was also another artist so it's a little "away" from the sculpture ... I understand you..
Something went wrong...
82 days

scattered to an abstraction

interpretation :the couple (real) blown away by the winds becomes virtual (a trace)
Something went wrong...
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