In search of a word

When this song popped out of my iPod last night, I was in the next room. Something about the tone of the music carried and made me hear for the first time.

Having never really understood the text, I went looking for a translation. A quick scan of the google pointed only to the French lyrics, which was handy but only took me so far as my French could flatteringly be described as beginner to immediate. There is sure to be an English version of two (million) out there, but translating and playing around did keep me from the TV and a documentary about an over-rated Australian pub band that somehow had a bunch of hits. It seems the title is something of a paradox, and resists literal translation. (The lyrics of Je t'aime moi non plus don't make much literal sense, but nobody complains about that.)

Fuir le bonheur de peur qu’il ne se sauve was written by Serge Gainsbourg and sung by Jane Birkin. The song was written in the wake of their break-up, a parting gift, and released in 1983.

Like its title, Fuir le bonheur de peur qu’il ne se sauve resists surrendering its passport to English pop. What is it? (Let's not call it a certain je ne sais quoi.) The bittersweet quality of the lyric is in the DNA of the song. The tension between the song and the singer is part of it: the lover telling the loved to flee, run away. An abject, adolescent response (a fear of intimacy?), might be all that such a stance could offer turns transcendent. If the song has a counterpart in English, then perhaps something like Hallelujah by Leonard Cohen might come closest. To my ears there is an intensity to the melody and the lyric that all Serge.

Catherine Deneuve read the text at Serge Gainsbourg's funeral. Serge Gainsbourg died in 1991.

There are numerous versions of Fuir le bonheur on YouTube, filmed over many years. In a late version, the television audience stands when Jane Birkin enters the studio, and again at the song's end. I saw Jane Birkin perform at the Recital Centre in 2012. She sang this song, accompanied by a Japanese quartet. Wonderful.

I have no doubt taken taken liberties with the translation. Apologies for the clunks. 

Fuir le bonheur de peur qu’il ne se sauve

Serge Gainsbourg

Flee happiness lest it should disappear

That the azure sky turn purple

To think or move on to other things,

Would be better.

Flee happiness lest it should disappear

And say there is an ‘over the rainbow’

Always higher than the sun above.

Glorious to believe in the heaven,

To believe in gods

Even when all seems terrible to us

And in our hearts are blood and fire.

Flee happiness lest it should disappear,

Like a little mouse in an alcove corner

Sense the tip of its pink tail

Its eyes ablaze.

Flee happiness lest it should disappear

And say there is an ‘over the rainbow’

Always higher than the sun above

Glorious to believe in the heaven,

To believe in gods

Even when all seems terrible to us

And in our hearts are blood and fire.

Flee from happiness lest it should disappear

To see, sometimes to wish, to be safe from crying

Who knows the depth of things is unhappy

To believe in heaven,

To believe in gods

Even when all seems terrible to us

And in our hearts are blood and fire.

Flee from happiness lest it should disappear

Tell me you love me, again, if you dare

I would like that you find other things,

Better things

Flee from happiness lest it should disappear

And say there is an ‘over the rainbow’

Always higher than the sky above

Glorious.

(translation, Mike Shuttleworth)

Fuir le bonheur de peur qu'il ne se sauve

(Words and music by Sere Gainsbourg)

Fuir le bonheur de peur qu'il ne se sauve
que le ciel azuré ne vire au mauve
penser ou passer à autre chose
vaudrait mieux
fuir le bonheur de peur qu'il ne se sauve
se dire qu'il y a over the rainbow
toujours plus haut le soleil above
radieux
croire aux cieux croire aux dieux
même quand tout nous semble odieux
que notre cœur est mis à sang et à feu

fuir le bonheur de peur qu'il ne se sauve
comme une petite souris dans un coin d'alcôve
apercevoir le bout de sa queue rose
ses yeux fiévreux
fuir le bonheur de peur qu'il ne se sauve
se dire qu'il y a over the rainbow
toujours plus haut le soleil above
radieux
croire aux cieux croire aux dieux
même quand tout nous semble odieux
que notre cœur est mis à sang et à feu

fuir le bonheur de peur qu'il ne se sauve
avoir parfois envie de crier sauve
qui peut savoir jusqu'au fond des choses
est malheureux
fuir le bonheur de peur qu'il ne se sauve
se dire qu'il y a over the rainbow
toujours plus haut le soleil above
radieux
croire aux cieux croire aux dieux
même quand tout nous semble odieux
que notre cœur est mis à sang et à feu

fuir le bonheur de peur qu'il ne se sauve
dis-moi que tu m'aimes encore si tu l'oses
j'aimerais que tu te trouves autre chose
de mieux
fuir le bonheur de peur qu'il ne se sauve
se dire qu'il y a over the rainbow
toujours plus haut le soleil above
radieux

La crise...cinema?

My friend, a film reviewer, despairs of French movies. 

John, let's call him, is chugging back a minimum of four films each week. Some of them are from the Hexagon. Recently he slung me a fistful, including Welcome to the Sticks (Bienvenue chez les Ch'tis) and The Grocer's Son (Le Fils de l'epicier). And for good measure the 1968 Gainsbourg-Birkin premier collaboration, Slogan. 

Slogan is the story of an advertising man's midlife crisis (la crise du moyen age?), which is, I admit, a pretty banal plot. Seriously wealthy and successful guy gets bored flying to Venice to pick up advertising kudos. Meets beautiful, much younger woman, throws over wife. Fellini's 8 1/2 it is not. 

Jane Birkin is 22, wears improbably short frocks and speaks with an appalling accent. Until she auditioned for the film, Birkin had never spoken French. (She admits to all of this in an accompanying 30 minute documentary.) So, a middle-aged man fascinated by a woman far too young to be seen with who quickly becomes an obsession. My friend John might suggest here that this pretty much the French film industry's calling card...but back to Slogan.

This is a curious film. Made in 1968, it's oblivious to the Paris riots, even though when the couple do eventally (inevitably?) move in together it's in the shadow of the Pantheon. Don't look to cinema for history, I guess. Serge Gainsbourg's idea of revolution was something else altogether I suspect. The film is clunky in the script and the production. The pacing is uncertain and even the music written by Gainsbourg fails to establish a clear motif or mood. Laboured might best describe the enterprise. But the film established them as the "it couple" of the time and changed Birkin's life. 

Neither Birkin nor Gainsbourg seem comfortable in front of the camera. There is often a self-consciousness that makes viewing the film uncomfortable. And yet...and yet. What starts as the lament of a middle-aged man turns into something much more interesting. Because as Evelyne, Birkin's ingenue becomes the rebel. There is one darkly funny, slightly cringe-making scene in which Serge introduces Evelyne to a score of friends and colleagues: "Please meet my little home-breaker" he says to a gallery of disapproving faces. Clearly infidelity is okay as long as it stays out of sight. Everything about their relationship put two fingers up to the ruling standards of the day. And their affair does catch a certain joy.

But the beautiful Evelyne quickly finds herself in the role of haus-frau. Her status as mistress is deeply uncertain. She demands that they have a baby, and that they marry. Both options seem rather quaint nowadays, but likely perhaps then. Not even frequent trips Venice can quell the resistance, her apparent freedom now another prison. In Venice Evelyne meets a muscular Italian whose only qualifications for her heart seem to be driving a speedboat dangerously fast through the crowded canals and clambering onto historic bridges. Bogans it seems are international.

Serge meanwhile seems impervious to what goes on about him. He never seems to really solicit our sympathy, continuing in his lugubrious way. Until Evelyne and the Italian elope. And then he turns very nasty indeed. But freedom won't be denied. What is most striking is the extent to which Slogan unwittingly provides the template for Birkin and Gainsbourg's own relationship, which lasted twelve years. Birkin sets out the influence of Serge Gainsbourg on her life with lasting affection and respect.

In the DVD's accompanying documentary, Birkin talks of their separation as like an adolescent revolt, kicking over the boundaries set up by a tyrannical parent. She also talks about Serge's peculiar attractiveness and charm. It's a fascinating relationship that began with Slogan. Birkin has made over 60 films: this one launched her career and changed her life. Even my friend the film critic must concede that you have to start somewhere.

Clearly Gainsbourg would have been a man that was difficult to live with. This little reflection by UK music writer Nick Kent on Gainsbourg's later years spells out just what a mess he became. (Oh that Kent could write with the same candour about, say, Keith Richard.) Serge Gainsbourg's life will get a more detailed examination when the biopic appears next year.