Oyendo a un hombre facil ...

Guest   Mon Jan 21, 2008 7:35 pm GMT
Please can you translate this:
- Oyendo a un hombre facil es acertar donde vio la luz del sol:Si os alaba Inglaterra, sera ingles. Si os habla mal de Prusia, es un francés.
Y si habla mal de España, es español

¡Por España, y el que quiera
defenderla, honrado muera;
y el que, traidor, la abandone,
no tenga quien le perdone,
ni en tierra santa cobijo,
ni una cruz en sus despojos,
ni las manos de un buen hijo
para cerrarle los ojos!
Eduardo Marquina. «En Flandes se ha puesto el sol»

Thanks
Guest   Mon Jan 21, 2008 8:14 pm GMT
Listening to a man it's easy to know where he was born, if he adores England he'd be English. If he badmouths Prussia, he's French. And if he badmouths Spain, he's an Spaniard.

For Spain, and whoever wants
to defend her, honoured it should died
and that whom cowardly leaves it
should not be forgiven
not be covered in holy land
nor place a cross in his grave
nor have the hand of a good son
to close his eyes.
Guest   Mon Jan 21, 2008 9:05 pm GMT
Many thanks Guest. Some comments to the above translation.
'he was born' has the same meaning as 'vio la luz del sol' but i can say where he saw the light of sun. I want to say : Can you understand it?
'badmouth' is a new word for me. If badmouth exist does goomouth exist too?
why do you use 'it should died ' because it is subjuntive in spanish?
the other 'should' is for the same reason?
Thanks again for the translation.
guest   Mon Jan 21, 2008 9:13 pm GMT
<<exist does goomouth exist too?>>

I suppose it would be "goodmouth", but you seldom (if ever) hear this word. "Badmouth" is common, though.
guest   Mon Jan 21, 2008 9:18 pm GMT
<<why do you use 'it should died ' because it is subjuntive in spanish? >>

"honored it should die" sounds funny to me. Perhaps it should be "honored, they die", where this is perhaps a use of the "singular they" in English.
The guest who translated   Mon Jan 21, 2008 9:23 pm GMT
Well, actually the whole thing is pretty archaic even in Spanish, some of the sentences took me a couple of seconds to think how to translate it, so it would only be logical that they sounded weird in English as well.