Glossary entry

French term or phrase:

et Dieu sait s'il lui en passait, par la tête,

English translation:

and God knows, he certainly did have some / masses of ... going through his mind / on in his mind

Added to glossary by Tony M
Apr 13, 2007 07:19
17 yrs ago
French term

Et Dieu sait s'il lui en passait, par la tête,

Non-PRO French to English Other Religion L'Abbe Pierre
On n'arrêtait pas l'abbé Pierre. Parfois, comme chacun de nous, il disait ce qui lui passait par la tête. Et Dieu sait s'il lui en passait, par la tête, des idées, des sentiments, des élans et des fureurs sacrées ! Des sottises aussi.
Change log

Apr 13, 2007 07:55: writeaway changed "Level" from "PRO" to "Non-PRO"

Votes to reclassify question as PRO/non-PRO:

Non-PRO (1): Kathryn Strachecky

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Proposed translations

+11
22 mins
French term (edited): Et Dieu sait s'il lui en passait, par la tête, des ...
Selected

And God knows, he certainly did have some / masses of ... going through / in his mind

I think in this particular construction, the present tense 'God knows' is more natural in English.

And I think the phrase works better too if you add in the emphatic 'certainly did...' or something of that kind, and likewise something to convey the idea of 'loads off / masses of', rather than the weak 'some'.
Peer comment(s):

agree writeaway : definitely. this is the register of the text.
9 mins
Thanks, W/A!
agree Bourth (X)
14 mins
Thanks, Alex!
agree Rob Grayson
14 mins
Thanks, Rob!
agree Alison Jenner
19 mins
Thanks, Alison!
agree Alain Pommet : PS - you're brave Tony, mentioning His name - now wait for the discussion about whether it was an intended play on a figure of speech etc...
21 mins
Thx, A! Well, I wouldn't condone gratuitous blasphemy, but I think we are amongst professionals here, and it has after all become such a commonplace expression; + the author wrote it about Abbé Pierre, so must've felt it was acceptable here
agree Assimina Vavoula
57 mins
Efharisto, Assimina!
agree Melzie
1 hr
Thanks, Melzie!
agree Vicky Papaprodromou
2 hrs
Efharisto, Vicky!
agree Evi Prokopi (X)
4 hrs
Efharisto, Evi!
agree katsy
9 hrs
Thanks, Katsy!
agree Raymonde Gagnier
22 hrs
Thanks, Rousselures!
Something went wrong...
4 KudoZ points awarded for this answer. Comment: "Merci a tous"
15 mins

And God knew what came to his mind

That's what I would write here.
Peer comment(s):

neutral writeaway : by using the past tense of 'know', it sounds like a religious sermon, but it's just an expression.
13 mins
Something went wrong...
52 mins

And god knows a lot of feelings, ideas... went through his head

And god knows a lot of feelings, ideas, (...) went through his head but also some foolishness/silly things!
Something went wrong...
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