A colleague in Italian is having some trouble with a couple
of sentences by Brecht, which he is translating into
English for the sub-titles of a DVD of a recent strike in
southern Italy (I get the impression Brecht would not have
disapproved of this use of his work). As you can see he is
not making much sense of them. Could anyone say where they
might come from? Then we can put him on the right track.
These are the two Brecht phrases in Italian:
A chi si deve, se dura l'oppressione? A noi.
A chi si deve, se sarà spezzata? Sempre a noi.
I'd translate them as: "Who is down to, if
oppression lasts - to us.
"Who is down to, whether the chains are broken -
once again to us".
thanks
Julian Preece
Kent
|