Margo Eatmon
Ms. Robinson
AP English 3
1 August 2007
François Villon
The French poet from whose Ballade des pendus Truman Capote excerpted to open the crime novel, In Cold Blood, is the François Villon of Paris in the mid-1400s. An ironically fitting speaker, Villon was a noted criminal in France, originally charged with the murder of a priest (a sentence from which he was royally pardoned), the poet also tested the strength of the law through his numerous acts of robbery and assault. His final arrest for brawling in 1462 proved François’ royal protection waning, as he was tortured and sentenced to death by hanging–the verdict for an ungovernable life that held greater crimes against man than literary gifts of the gods. While awaiting execution, Villon wrote (among other works) Ballade des pendus, the Ballad of the hanged. Following are the original French text and two English translations of the lines selected by Capote:
Frères humains qui après nous vivez,
N’ayez les cuers contre nous endurcis,
Car, se pitié de nous povres avez,
Dieu en aura plus tost de vous mercis . (Villon)
My brothers who live after us,
Don’t harden you hearts against us too,
If you have mercy now on us,
God may have mercy upon you. (Kline)
O Brother men who live, though we are gone,
Let not your hearts be hardened at the view,
For if you pity us you gaze upon,
God is more like to show you mercy too . . .(Brooks)
I prefer the second translation, by E Bruce Brooks, because the pleading expressed in the original French words remains: rather than a distant proverb (as Kline forces the verse to appear), the poem is the cry of a dying man. Surely Capote felt appropriate the words of a man in the same position as his own characters, Dick and Perry. The lines, though poetic, are as raw as if uttered by any man who has forfeited his life, even the poorly literate Clutter murderers. Though a nonfiction novel, In Cold Blood is the work of Truman Capote, who felt the need to speak for men whose factual representations did not suggest the mercy desired. Perhaps Capote planted the verses of Villon to remind the citizens of Kansas and the United States how they lost the mercy of God. Ironically, François Villon’s hanging sentence was revoked in exchange for life banishment from Paris, while the necks of Richard Hickock and Perry Smith broke in a state-mandated noose.
Works Cited
Brooks, Bruce E. “Villon: Ballade des Pendus.” Univeristy of Massachussetts. 05 Dec 2002. 1 Aug 2007 <http://www.umass.edu/wsp/lectures/translation/villon.html>.
Kline, A. S.. “François Villon Poems.” Poetry in Translation. 2004. 1 Aug 2007 <http://www.tonykline.co.uk/PITBR/French/Villon.htm#_Toc71176002>.
Villon, François. Ballade des pendus.
