English translation: Let us agree and put the farce to this odd use.
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German to English translations [PRO] Art/Literary - Poetry & Literature / Goethe Faust
German term or phrase: „So mag es bei der Fratze bleiben.“
This is a statemeny that appears in Faust.
I wonder what it means in the context.
„So mag es bei der Fratze bleiben.“
The statement appear in the followng pagssage on teh German wikipedia
Das Wort „Fratze“ bedeutete noch bis ins 19. Jahrhundert auch ein (teuflisches) Trugwerk. In diesem Sinn hat es Goethe in seinem Faust mehrfach und mit Nachdruck verwendet: Im ersten Teil, als der Professor den Teufelspakt mit Blut unterschreibt und das nicht recht ernst nehmen will, sagt er: „So mag es bei der Fratze bleiben.“ Im zweiten Teil, als sich Mephistopheles als Narr maskiert, heißt es von ihm: „Gar köstlich ist er aufgeputzt, / Doch fratzenhaft, dass Jeder stutzt.“
Wherefore thy passion so excite
And thus thine eloquence inflame? 1410
A scrap is for our compact good.
Thou under-signest merely with a drop of blood.
FAUST
If this will satisfy thy mind,
Thy whim I’ll gratify, howe’er absurd.
@Yorrick:
I wasn't going to suggest my own version, but this is what you find on the internet and, as an example, I believe it does convey the meaning correctly. "Nothing true", "nothing serious", "just a gimmick (Mätzchen)" that's Faust's opinion on signing this pact with his blood but it is much more than that, it was a betrayal, a trick but all these expressions can be rolled into one with "Fratze" a mask that conceals the truth, for fun, for laughter, or for deceit.
Mephistopheles hints at that with the famous phrase in the next sentence:
"Blut ist ein ganz besondrer Saft."
QUOTE: ‘Wenn dies dir völlig Gnüge tut. | So mag es bei der Fratze bleiben’. I paraphrase: “Well, if that’s good enough for you, let’s do it your way which, frankly, is ludicrous.” Faust is offended that someone should take his name scratched on a piece of paper more serious than his word. That’s what the preceding outburst is all about (and hence his sarcastic proposal of chiselling it into marble). Might one say that in his view a [signed] piece of paper would masquerade as his [spoken] word - - if we insist on the image suggested by ‘Fratze’? Or that he takes such a document to be a mere caricature (of his word)? I’m probably making too much of this. But please note also that Faust satirises a parchment as a ‘Gespenst, vor dem sich alle scheuen’.
In any case, I believe that ‘Fratze’ here denotes ‘nonsense’ or ‘absurdity’, but I’d also go along with Bernhard’s ‘farce’ or 'gimmick'.
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"This is after all nothing but a grimace."
Explanation: Up until the nineteenth century, the word "grimace" also meant a (devilish) work of deception. Goethe frequently and emphatically used it in this sense throughout his Faust: In the first part, when the Professor seals his pact with the Devil in blood without taking himself too seriously, he says: "This is after all nothing but a grimace." In the second part, when Mephistopheles disguises himself as a fool, the statement comes from him: "He is all spruced up, / But his grimace looks so grotesque, that everybody is taken aback."
andres-larsen Venezuela Local time: 07:50 Native speaker of: English
The translation workplace 
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