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French to English translations [Non-PRO]
General / Conversation / Greetings / Letters / fashion | | French term or phrase: pari qu'ils se sont lancés | Good afternoon,
I have a text about two designers who have opened a concept store together, the French text says:
"Réunir des des accessoires, des objets d’art et du mobilier éclectique, voici le pari que se sont lancé mrX et mr Y en ouvrant leur boutique situé....
I'm wondering if I need to translate this as:
"The bet that mr X and mr Y made was to collect art objects and eclectic furniture for the opening of...
but I make it sound as if this is for the actual opening
I probably should just put "they decided" or something of the sort really but I'm trying to stick to the original text :)
Your suggestions are welcome!
Thank you :) |
| loulou79KudoZ activityQuestions: 529 ( 1 open) ( 10 without valid answers) ( 15 closed without grading) Answers: 8
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| | the challenge they set themselves | Explanation:
A distillation of the other two suggestions already made, but I can't help feeling that this is the combination that works best in your context.
I have to say that I think your proposed translation actually departs too far from the actual meaning of the source text, while not getting far enough away from a French-sounding structure that won't sound a bit natural in EN.
In particular, it's not "for the opening of..." (they're not collecting all these thing just for the 'inauguration'), but rather "the act of opening a store"; and furthermore, I don't think 'collecting' is a good concept to use here; they are not 'collectors' themselves, but are putting together a collection to offer their customers. But beware, as 'collection' is often associated with something seasonal, a range of products as, e.g. in fashion. So 'collection' has a loaded meaning that might be unwelcome here in EN.
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Note added at 34 minutes (2012-02-01 13:03:50 GMT)
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BTW, 'bet' would hardly ever work here in EN — sometimes, 'wager' can work better, especially when being used figuratively as here rather than literally (in which sense 'wager' is now rather dated').
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Note added at 2 heures (2012-02-01 15:09:17 GMT)
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I still think that 'putting together' sounds rather weak and down-register (not too say perhaps too colloquial) for what they are doing here; would you say "dear old Queen Betty has put together a nice load of old bling to display at the Tower of London"?! :-)))
And I'm still concerned about the use of 'when', which is in danger of introducing an unwelcome temporal element.
To try and make it sound more... English, why not something like:
"In opening their store, Flopsy and Mopsy were setting themselves a challenge to bring together...." |
| Selected response from:
 Tony M
France
Local time: 13:32
| Grading comment Thank you
4 KudoZ points were awarded for this answer |
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The translation workplace 
peer agreement (net): +2
