Le Crepuscule Du Soir Analysis

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In translating Baudelaire 's “Le Crépuscule du soir,” I primarily focussed on meaning, as opposed to meter, grammar, or rhyme scheme. To this purpose, the translation attempts to stay as close to the original text as possible, with a few subjective decisions made to preserve some of the connections which are made in the french. The first of these decisions actually occurs in the title itself, “Le Crépuscule du soir”. “Crépuscule” is literally “twilight”, and both words contain the ambiguity of referring to either dusk or dawn, so “twilight” is an acceptable translation. “Soir”, however, is most commonly seen translated as “night”, whereas in the context of the poem, “evening” has been chosen. “Evening” is more appropriate than “night” …show more content…
In Line 14, Baudelaire uses “les lueurs”, which can be translated as “glow”, “gleam”, “glimmers”, or “lights”. Here, “lights” was chosen as it both conveys the general meaning of “les lueurs” and also preserves the possible reference to the gas-lamps of Paris, the city which is being described in “Le Crépuscule du soir”. Thus, “lights” connotes what it needs to, and also leads into the next translational decision, “s 'allume” (Line 15). Line 15 has been translated as “Prostitution illuminates in the streets”, with “s 'allume” translated as “illuminates”. Choices for properly translating “s 'allume” are limited due to the reflexive nature of the verb; in the poem, Prostitution is not revealed, or even acted upon. Prostitution creates itself, in the same way that the gas lights of Paris light up in the evening. This agency of Prostitution is the reasoning behind the next translational decision, “elle ouvre ses issues” (Line 16). “Elle ouvre ses issues” can be properly translated as either “she opens her exits” or “she issues her charges”. Given the agency of Prostitution, and the author 's apparent attempt to establish Prostitution as a force as opposed to a conglomerate of people, “she issues her charges” seems most in-line with the french. This choice also ties in well with a general theme of the poem, which is those people who haven 't “even lived” (Line 38). Beginning with the “obstinate scholar” and the “bent worker” (Lines 9 and 10) and moving through to the thieves who are stealing “in order to live and few days and clothe their mistresses” (Line 28), people acting as ants who are controlled by larger forces (like Prostitution) is a theme emphasized in the french and now present in the

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