INGLESE / ENGLISH / ANGLAIS [1] - John Brunner

Broadside #50 september 1964

Boris Vian, poet, novelist, amateur jazz trumpeter and left-wing activist, died - I believe in 1959 - at the comparatively early age of 45. His best-known works are a novel about race prejudice, "J' Irai Cracher sur vos Tombes" (I will Spit on your Graves)' from which an extremely bad movie was made just before his death, and this song, a protest against the Algerian war. It was recorded very successfully by the Algerian singer Mouloudji, but was banned by the French government and withdrawn in both printed and recorded versions; we first heard it in Sweden (translated very well, I'm told), and then on discovering its origin attempted without success to locate a copy in France, Belgium or Britain. The French text was eventually supplied to us by some pacifists in Lyons; I prepared the translation and my wife Marjorie... (continuer)