Rive gauche [English translation]

I recall the songs of Prévert's

and of all those who whisper Verlaine1

and the shouts of good old stormy Ferré.

Boris Vian shall be written with a trumpet.

Left bank in Paris.

Farewell, my country

of music and poetry.

The ill-mannered merchants

who took everything from other places

come to bookstore to sell their attires.

In bookstores.

However tender the night might be,

it passes.

Oh my Zelda, Montparnasse is dead and gone.

Miles Davis tuning on his Gréco2

As all the Morissons3 on their Nico4.

Left bank in Paris.

Oh my island, oh my country

of music and poetry,

in love with art and freedom.

It has got caught, it's been conquered.

It will die eventually, whatever they say,

and my song turns it into melancholy5.

Life is theater and memories,

still we persist in not dying,

hanging about on the banks. Come here and see,

it looks like Jane and Serge on the Pont des Arts.

Left bank in Paris,

farewell my country.

Farewell Jazz, farewell night,

a state within the state of mind6,

considered with contempt,

like Quebec by the United States,

and like us too...

Ah! The contempt...

Ah! The contempt...

1. The pun is on "souffleur de verre" (glass blower). A "souffleur" can also be a prompter (in a theater), but here "souffler" is meant as "whisper".2. The French is a bit strange here. "sonner" can have a few different meanings, but here I suppose Souchon invents a new one, like "play music", based on "ring" (as a melody does)3. Could allude both to Sterling and Jim4. Besides the alliteration, the sentence could be read as "All the dead play a tune for their Nico"5. Souchon invented that verb6. The pun is the same in French, but I don't really get it