Two fun ways to work on your B language

Example 1: Speech in French by Bruno Le Maire (France’s Minister of Economics)

This extract is taken from a speech about France’s financing of climate change measures in developing countries.

“Ces excellents chiffres démontrent l’engagement et la constance de la France en matière d’aide à la lutte contre le changement climatique. Dans le même temps, ils montrent aussi que la finance climat ne peut s’appuyer sur les seuls financements publics pour changer la donne, y compris ceux de la France qui compte parmi les principaux contributeurs à la finance climat dans le monde. Il nous faut passer à l’échelle supérieure et, au-delà de la cible des 100 milliards de dollars, mobiliser les financements de toutes sources et en particulier entraîner davantage de financements privés au service des stratégies climatiques des pays en développement. À cet égard la feuille de route issue du Sommet de Paris pour un nouveau pacte financier mondial doit nous permettre d’améliorer collectivement notre efficacité et notre impact.”

This passage contains a few challenges for retourists (although you may have encountered these expressions many times before, depending on the type of interpreting you do). I have highlighted in bold some of the phrases that you might have to give a little thought to.

Here’s what Google Translate offers:

“These excellent figures demonstrate France’s commitment and consistency in helping to combat climate change. At the same time, they also show that climate finance cannot rely on public financing alone to change the situation, including that of France, which is among the main contributors to climate finance in the world. We need to scale up and, beyond the $100 billion target, mobilize funding from all sources and in particular attract more private funding to serve the climate strategies of developing countries. In this regard, the roadmap resulting from the Paris Summit for a new global financial pact should allow us to collectively improve our efficiency and impact.”

There are some useful options here, including “commitment” (“engagement” can be a little tricky, and 90% of the time is best rendered by something other than engagement in English), “scale up”, “attract funding”, and “roadmap”.

“Changer la donne” has been translated by “change the situation”, which is quite a plain version, but gives the idea clearly.

The Google Translate version also demonstrates one of the pitfalls of this method, which is that the English translation has changed the meaning of the French, or is at the very least ambiguous. The French reads “la finance climat ne peut s’appuyer sur les seuls financements publics pour changer la donne, y compris ceux de la France qui compte parmi les principaux contributeurs à la finance climat dans le monde”; but the English makes it sound as if we’re talking about changing France’s situation: “climate finance cannot rely on public financing alone to change the situation, including that of France”.

Make sure you read the output carefully to check the meaning. If you’re having a second attempt at sight translating the passage, don’t copy anything that’s plain wrong or badly expressed! I find the translated version is often too literal or sticks too closely to the input language’s sentence structure, i.e. by all means pick up useful terminology, but don’t expect the output to give you ideal solutions for sentence structure.

One more possible problem to point out: the translation renders “efficace” as efficient. Alas, “efficace” in French means both efficient and effective. The choice of term depends on the meaning. Personally, I think the meaning here is “effective”.

Let’s compare this with the DeepL version:

“These excellent figures demonstrate France’s commitment and steadfastness in helping to combat climate change. At the same time, they also show that climate finance cannot rely on public funding alone to make a difference, including from France, one of the world’s leading contributors to climate finance. We need to move up a gear and, beyond the $100 billion target, mobilize financing from all sources, and in particular attract more private financing to support developing countries’ climate strategies. In this respect, the roadmap that emerged from the Paris Summit for a new global financial pact should enable us to collectively improve our effectiveness and impact.

Here we have a few more options: “steadfastness”; “make a difference” (for “changer la donne”), “move up a gear”.

Example 2: short passage about whisky in French

“Si cette production en quantités limitées peut être un frein au développement du whisky français, notamment à l’export, elle a tout de même un avantage, celui de répondre à la tendance actuelle du « craft ». D’autant que les producteurs français ont tendance à privilégier les circuits courts et à miser sur la transparence et la traçabilité.”

Let’s say you want to sight translate this from French into English. It may take you a moment to think of good solutions for “un frein au développement” (maybe the first thing that springs to mind is “a brake”, but that doesn’t sound right), “répondre à la tendance actuelle”, “privilégier les circuits courts”, and “miser sur la transparence”.

The risk if you’re working from French into English is that you will stick too closely to the French (i.e. copy the word “privilege” for instance). The result will be over-literal and sound unnatural.

Let’s take a look at what Google Translate gives us for this paragraph.

“If this production in limited quantities can be a hindrance to the development of French whisky, particularly for export, it still has an advantage, that of responding to the current “craft” trend. Especially since French producers tend to favor short circuits and focus on transparency and traceability.”

Now we need to assess the output.

I rather like “be a hindrance” for “un frein au développement”. You could take things a step further by looking it up on Linguee, for instance, where you would find alternatives such as “an impediment” or “an obstacle”.

“Favor” is a good solution for “privilégier” (we obviously want to avoid saying “they privilege short circuits”), and “focus on” works pretty well for “miser sur” (the literal meaning is “bank on” or “rely on”, but these are not so successful).

On the other hand, I’m not so keen on “short circuits”, which I don’t think is the most commonly used expression in English, and clauses beginning with “si” always ring alarm bells, since they’re not always true conditionals in French. If I were interpreting this into English, I would not begin with “if this production…can be a hindrance”.

Let’s take a look at DeepL:

This version has fixed the “if” problem, and offers us “short distribution channels”, which I think is clearer in English than “short circuits”. To be honest, I often go for something that emphasises local production or direct sales, since that reflects the idea in French.

Example 3: Wagyu beef, English>French

A seemingly random topic – I’m sure you will have guessed I was preparing for an assignment.

This is the paragraph I put through Google Translate.

“We also have a small but wonderful fold of Highland cattle. Our mission is to produce the best beef in the world from our 25,000-acre estate, set within the majestic highland landscape of Perthshire, Scotland which offers rich, fertile grasslands on which all our herds graze.

Established by husband and wife team Mohsin Altajir and Martine Chapman in 2011, our ethos of quality, respect and precision underpins everything we do. What should have been a hobby turned into a full blown business overnight. Mohsin was playing golf six days a week and Martine was looking for something to sink her teeth into.

They had never set foot on a farm before or been up close and personal with cattle. It was their passion for great quality produce and their love of animals that saw them move to the Highlands of Scotland and so Highland Wagyu was born.”

If you’re not Scottish, you may not know what a “fold” of cattle is. There are also a few idiomatic expressions in this text that might give you pause if you’re working into a B language.

Here is Google Translate’s version:

“Nous avons également un petit mais merveilleux élevage de bovins Highland. Notre mission est de produire le meilleur bœuf au monde à partir de notre domaine de 25 000 acres, situé dans le majestueux paysage des hautes terres du Perthshire, en Écosse, qui offre des prairies riches et fertiles sur lesquelles paissent tous nos troupeaux. Créée par l’équipe mari et femme Mohsin Altajir et Martine Chapman en 2011, notre philosophie de qualité, de respect et de précision sous-tend tout ce que nous faisons. Ce qui aurait dû être un passe-temps s’est transformé du jour au lendemain en une véritable entreprise. Mohsin jouait au golf six jours par semaine et Martine cherchait de quoi se mettre à pleines dents. Ils n’avaient jamais mis les pieds dans une ferme auparavant ni été en contact étroit avec du bétail. C’est leur passion pour les produits de grande qualité et leur amour des animaux qui les ont amenés à s’installer dans les Highlands d’Écosse et c’est ainsi qu’est né Highland Wagyu.

And DeepL’s:

“Nous possédons également un petit mais merveilleux troupeau de bovins des Highlands. Notre mission est de produire le meilleur bœuf du monde à partir de notre domaine de 25 000 acres, situé dans le majestueux paysage des Highlands du Perthshire, en Écosse, qui offre des prairies riches et fertiles sur lesquelles paissent tous nos troupeaux.

Fondée en 2011 par Mohsin Altajir et Martine Chapman, une équipe composée d’un mari et d’une femme, notre éthique de la qualité, du respect et de la précision est à la base de tout ce que nous faisons. Ce qui aurait dû être un hobby s’est transformé en une véritable entreprise du jour au lendemain. Mohsin jouait au golf six jours par semaine et Martine cherchait quelque chose à se mettre sous la dent.

Ils n’avaient jamais mis les pieds dans une ferme auparavant et n’avaient jamais côtoyé de près le bétail. C’est leur passion pour les produits de grande qualité et leur amour des animaux qui les ont amenés à s’installer dans les Highlands, en Écosse, et c’est ainsi qu’est né Highland Wagyu.”

Let’s go through the two translations and see what we can pick up:

• “nous possédons” gives us a more formal version of “nous avons” un troupeau
• a cattle fold is clearly a “troupeau” (or “élevage”)
• “s’est transformé en véritable entreprise du jour au lendemain” works well for “turned into a full blown business overnight”
• “jamais mis les pieds” is good
• “contact étroit avec le bétail” and “côtoyer” could both work
• I have concerns about “quelque chose à se mettre sous la dent”! It sounds as if Martine wants something to eat, as opposed to sinking her teeth into a new project. In other contexts, I might try “s’attaquer à”. What about “un nouveau défi à relever”, or simply “un nouveau projet”?

I’ve deliberately chosen not to share “perfect” versions from DeepL or Google Translate (I doubt that there is such a thing anyway).

Instead, I hope I’ve illustrated for you how I use this tool in practice. It can be a useful shortcut, because it saves time on looking words up in the dictionary or using a collocations dictionary. It can partially compensate for the lack of a practice partner or coach, but it works best if your B language is already strong, so you can filter out the dross and spot little gems.