Henry Miller

When I set up this blog (see left sidebar) I made half a promise to translate a little known book by Henry Miller called J’suis pas plus con qu’un autre. And I would probably have started before now, if I hadn’t attempted to disprove Miller’s title: some people are more idiot than others.  I lost my copy of the book. 

It is a small book.  In the Domaine Etranger edition there are 79 pages, and it had somehow slotted in with my other slim volumes, on the poetry shelf.  This explains why it took me many months to find it.  And when I did spot it among the poetry, I immediately reclaimed it because it was prose.

The curiosity of I’m No More of an Idiot is that Miller wrote the book in French (in 1976, at the age of 85), and then left in the errors.  It is therefore a book in French by an Anglophone with an attempt to preserve the foreign accent.  This has always seemed to me an attractive idea: if Jane Birkin can forge a life-long career in Paris simply through speaking anglicised French, then the same effect in writing could seduce the jury of the Prix Goncourt.

It works both ways, French-English as well as English-French.  Antoine des Caunes, who some will remember as the presenter of Eurotrash, survived on British TV for fourteen years with no other trick than this: he spoke English with a French accent.  It was 14-years’ worth of endearing.

Henry Miller’s book tests the theory that bad French will be somehow attractive to read.  It’s worth translating for several reasons.  I don’t think it’s been done before.  There’s also the cussedness of the thing - Miller suggests he can write in French thoughts he can’t express in English.  So are they the same thoughts when translated back into his native language?

It’s also interesting for what Miller has to say.  He scoots from writers he hates (mostly the classics) to Americans he hates (nearly all of them).  He does like Paris, and he’s very keen on his own writing, and he has a good word for anyone who helped him when he was young and struggling.  This is Henry Miller in 79 pages, in French.  Only now also in English.  Serialised exclusively on this blog.

Henry Miller rides bikes

For some time I’ve been gearing up to translate a short and little-known book by Henry Miller called I’m no More of an Idiot than Anybody Else.  Maybe.  Despite the fact that Henry Miller is American, and wrote in English, he made an exception for Je Ne Suis Pas Plus Con Qu’un Autre.

There in the title lies the first dilemma.  ‘Con’ is perhaps the most common French curse word.  Certainly, it is a word that most Anglophones will hear at some stage on any visit to France, often prefaced with ‘espece de’.  However, your French antagonist may be calling you something more or less rude than you think – the exact equivalent in English is unclear.  Strictly speaking, a con is a cunt, but this translation is far too extreme in English.  The French aren’t that rude, or not on an everyday basis.  Yet ‘Idiot’ isn’t quite right.  The Irish ‘eejit’ might come closer, except for its spectacular and confusing Irishness.

When in doubt,ask an expert.  I therefore put the question to my French translator Marie Rennard, who as well as doing a fantastic job on Dry Bones and Le Rugbyman Nomade, also writes an extraordinary blog, Melting Pot et vin blanc.

Marie tells me:

‘any adjective preceding (or following) ”con” in french will induce a different connotation, opening on a wide range of translations, “brave con” being far more indulgent than “indécrottable con” or “vieux con” or “sale con”.

Translations could vary from a light ”idiot” to much worse, all depending on the context. It comes from the latin cunus (vulve, or lapin – but I don’t know why – still, lapin lovers are  called “cuniculophiles”, which etymologically could also refer to con lovers). 

Con acquired its vulgar connotation in the 12th century, and became an insult during the 19th.  its original meaning of female genitalia is today completely forgotten, except among people who enjoy old books. Still, if the adjective used with the word can strengthen or weaken its meaning, it is important to note that who says it can also modify its strength. Remember Sarkozy’s “casse toi pauvre con”, which was perceived as much more injurious in his mouth than in any other.’

Ladies of the Night

It’s important to get these things right.  The worst case of misunderstanding I came across was in the Guardian, in a profile of the French novelist Michel Houellebecq. The interviewer expected him to be a foul-mouthed misogynist, and gleefully described how half-way through the interview Houellebecq answered the phone and repeatedly called his wife a whore.

I had a think about that. ‘Putain’ he must have been saying, ‘Putain.’  Anyone with a taste for colloquial French knows that this is close to ‘Fucking Hell’ or ‘Shit’, registering a standard-type amazement when listening to a story told by another.  Houellebecq was not calling his wife a whore.

Nor, for that matter, do  French school-children go around shouting ‘Drawing Pin!’ whenever they’re annoyed.  They do shout ‘Punaise!, often and loudly in every schoolyard in the land, and Punaise does mean Drawing Pin.  But what they’re actually saying is ‘Putain!’, in a way that won’t upset the teachers.