A few weird ones!

Hi, I have a few odd bits from some translations I am doing, with a couple of phrases I haven't come across before. If anyone recognises anything/has any ideas, that be would brilliant!

1. 'derriere sa facade de WASP police' (with accent on e here - sorry, computer being awkward..) - this is about an executive business man, no idea about the WASP, could be so many things...???

2. 'un avocat de Serie B' - think this is some kind of specialist financial lawyer, but is it common? And do we use it/an equivalent in English??

3. I have translated the following sentence 'Les yeux obliques se veulent proches et n'y reussissent pas: leur strabisme donne au regard un aspect ahuri...' as 'The crossed eyes aspire to a direct gaze, but fail: their squint gives them a dumbfounded look...' (I't describing a portrait, fairly literary in style...). Does this sound OK do you think??

Thanks very much, sorry they're a bit strange...

Clare

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Permalink Reply by lauris on April 26, 2011 at 3:59pm

Hi Clare

1. WASP means White Anglo Saxon Protestant. It's a stereotype for people, I invite you to read the wikipedia article for instance : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_Anglo-Saxon_Protestant

2. I think you have a trouble with 'Série B'. This is an idiom of the french language. 'Série B' refers to tv shows mainly which have little budget, and bad quality.

Here, you can understand that as 'a lawyer you could find in some crappy tv shows'

3. Without the context, the translation is hard but I'll go for :

"les yeux croisés aspirent à un regard direct (you can use 'aspirent' to say 'want to') mais n'y arrivent pas : leur strabisme leur donne un aspect ébahi ('ahuri sounds good to')"

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Permalink Reply by Benoît on April 26, 2011 at 4:54pm

It’s quite funny to see that for you Clare, WASP can have several meanings, whereas for me (a French guy) it can have only one: the one described by Lauris.

Years ago (and perhaps still now), this term was taught in French school.
For example Kennedy was the first (only one, before Obama) non-WASP president of United States, because he was Catholic and not Protestant…

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Permalink Reply by Clare H on April 26, 2011 at 8:27pm

Thanks very much both Benoit and Lauris. Interesting about WASP... I don't think it is commonly used in British English, so I am looking for an alternative phrase with similar connotations... maybe Ivy League, although not too sure about it. In Brit English we have Yuppie, but that tended to be people in their 20's/30's, and this guy is forty-odd.

As for the serie B, I really didn't know that, all my research online came up with was a very specific term for a particular type of lawyer dealing with the financial world. As for the translation, it's used in the text quite ironically I guess, so I might go for 'court room drama lawyer' as this sounds like the American crappy version of your serie B...??

Thanks again, Clare

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EducatorPermalink Reply by stu harris on April 26, 2011 at 8:39pm

I think WASP may be OK for British, but I've been away too long. Some people use the term vanilla, but that may not be widespread either.

If the character is American I suggest all-american boy.

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Permalink Reply by Clare H on April 26, 2011 at 9:54pm

Vanilla as in white? I haven't come across that one either. Asking a few more people in GB, some seem to know the WASP term vaguely, others not at all. The prob with all-american boy is that he is forty-odd... I suppose just all-american, but it doesn't really fit the context (the full phrase is 'I don't dare stand up to him because I can sense a great violence behind his civilised [WASP] facade'. Not sure if all-american is pointed enough?

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EducatorPermalink Reply by stu harris on April 26, 2011 at 10:08pm

I'm even more convinced that all-american boy is right.

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Permalink Reply by Benoît on April 26, 2011 at 10:25pm

Perhaps: “because I can sense a great violence behind his facade of civilized (sophisticated), wealthy and well established White Collar”?

(I'm not very good in English translation requiring such level of detail, but this doesn’t prevent me from trying… I’m French after all! ^^)

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Permalink Reply by Benoît on April 26, 2011 at 9:39pm

As Lauris said the 'Séries B' have little budget, low quality and most of time very bad actors.
"Un acteur de séries B" is very pejorative.
I don't know if all "court room dramas" are concidered as bad.

Perhaps "Cheap court room drama"? Or any additional word in order to emphasize the very low level of the drama (and by extension of the lawyer).

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Permalink Reply by Clare H on April 26, 2011 at 9:56pm

Hmm, thanks, that's useful - I will mull this one over for a while longer and try to come up with something along those lines...