Translation: Marie Antoinette Part 5

Sorry for the delay with this but it's finally online.

The exact translation in this video is probably a bit sloppy. I'm really out of practice with German which feels weird. It's almost like my old Elisabeth days when I had to stop and look things up every five minutes. Okay, in my really old Elisabeth days I had to look things up every five seconds but I digress. I was also rushing with this part to attempt to get it online and finished it at three a.m.. It's been three months since I uploaded the last part and, although I have good excuse, I feel really bad about that.

Claudia, a friend of mine from Austria helped me with a line that was causing me real trouble so thank you to her <3

Also, I still can't get accents to render properly on my hard subbing so some words are missing accents. Of course, this doesn't really affect English but this musical does like to chuck in the odd bit of French (translations below).

Anyway, talking about the video:

Axel has this lovely line where he says 'Wir sind freier als die meisten Menschen.' (We're freer than many people). It's a lovely concept. Although they're unhappy he knows that, in comparison, they're lucky and shouldn't complain. Annoyingly, free isn't commonly seen in a comparative fashion, and I'm unsure if technically it can be as you're either free or not. Apparently, there is a word "freer" so that's the one I used.

Maskenspiel is translated as masque not masquerade. A masque is a kind of big entertainment play dance song thing put on by players (within courts). Traditionally, masks would be worn by the players so this is a big metaphorical thing beyond just saying "we wear masks". A masquerade, is a ball at which people wore masks so slight difference :-)

Translations:

Mainly French, again, with a bit of Latin. My Latin is very rusty as I learned it many years ago so may not be accurate. Axel also 'translates it' in the musical. In fact, my French is getting rusty too but that's a complete other story!

Trés jolie, ne c'est pas? - Very pretty, isn't it?

Oui - Yes

Bon soir, Monsieur Orléans! - Good Evening Mr. Orléans!

Palais Royal - Royal Palace

Non! - No

Bien sur. - For sure.

Bien oui - Well yes

S'il vous plaît! - If you please (also means just "please")

Pour le plaisir - For pleasure. (This is kinda creepy in context!)

Dolore Fortiter - Sorrow bravely (Latin)

Quelle que soit - Whatever

Excuse-moi, chéri - Excuse me, dear.

Youtube news!

About four years ago I first started to subtitle Elisabeth. It was about a week before my birthday and, having discovered the magic of this musical I decided I wanted to share it with my friends who were coming round to celebrate my birthday (although, of course, it wasn't finished in time). Thus I decided to use a dictionary to translate my favourite musical. 

As you may well know, I had never intended to upload 'Elisabeth' onto youtube but in early 2010 my computer got a virus and, so that I didn't loose my work completely with the death of the computer, I uploaded them onto youtube. The response was instant and more positive than I could have believed. I decided to continue to upload the videos, as I made them.

Suddenly the project of a fourteen year old became something bigger and had more influence on my life than I could ever have imagined.

In the end, my friends never watched 'Elisabeth' with me, but people from all around the globe have shared it with me. I have had some amazing conversations with people because of Elisabeth, met some amazing people and, most importantly, I met three of my closest friends (Helena, Aleks, and Natascha) as a direct result of the show. 

Not only this, but I realised something... languages weren't that inaccessible to me. Sure, I struggled with French like mad but German, well I was learning that by accident. Because of the translating I became more confident and continued my French studies, picked up Japanese, and will be studying German and Hungarian at university next year.

But why am I writing this now?

Today, almost exactly four years after I subtitled my first video, my youtube channel hit 1000 subscribers.

So this is a thank you blog, really. If you are reading this then it's probably because you've been looking at my subtitles in some form, at some point over the years. Your messages, your views, everything, has encouraged me in so many ways. Yes, every creative member of 'Elisabeth', 'Rebecca', and 'Marie Antoinette' has had an influence too but it's been you, the people who have supported me, who have changed my life and for that I thank you.