# Trailing red smears, the tracks preceded them



## Emma59

Bonjour !

J'ai besoin de votre aide concernant un passage que je ne suis pas certaine d'avoir compris. Voilà le contexte : Un garçon et son père sont à la montagne pour la chasse à l'orignal. Sur leur route, ils découvrent des traces de sang, il y a énormément de sang et ils veulent trouver d'où elles viennent. Vient alors "trailing red smears, the tracks preceded them" puis "within fifty feet they found the body. It was half-buried" ...etc. 

A votre avis, est-ce que "tracks" ici désigne les sentiers qu'ils laissent derrière eux, ou bien les traces ? Car la phrase me paraît bizarre. 

Merci d'avance !


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## Keith Bradford

Here, _tracks = footprints _(and other marks such as broken twigs).


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## Emma59

Ok. But isn't that sentence "weird" ? I mean I don't understand why the author added the second part. Do you think "ils suivirent les traînées rouges, laissant les traces de leur passage derrière eux" would be ok ? A literal translation like "ils suivirent les traînées rouges, précédés par les traces" does not sound good at all..


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## mgarizona

Have to disagree: the "tracks" ARE the "trailing red smears" ... those smears are the tracks left by the carcass being dragged away, they are the tracks the father and son are following.


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## frog1gsu

Bonjour Emma59,

I think it means that the tracks - i.e. footprints - went out ahead of them, and that these footprints had little patches of blood on them - "trailing red smears." So it is not _their _footprints, but those of the people in front of them that the passage is talking about. The tracks lead to the half-buried body.


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## Emma59

In this case, I'm even more confused. There is no point in writing such a sentence. "Ils suivirent les trainées rouges, laissant les empreintes derrière eux" then ?


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## Ellea1

What is the whole sentence? Does the previous sentence of the next one says whose footprints it is?

I think of "tracks" as "footprints" as well.

Suivant la piste des tâches de sang, des empreintes de pas les précédaient...

Ils suivaients les tâches de sang précédés par des empreintes (laissés par d'autres)??

Suivant les tâches de sang, ces traces les précédaient??


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## Emma59

The whole sentence is what I wrote in my first post. There are no details :/    "Trailing red smears, the tracks preceded them. Within fifty feet they found the body. It was half-buried"


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## frog1gsu

Ellea1 said:


> Suivant la piste des tâches de sang, des empreintes de pas? les précédaient...
> 
> Ils suivaients les tâches de sang précédés par des empreintes (laissés par d'autres)??



"trailing red smears" (quoique ça manque de sens pour moi) appartient ici à "the tracks preceded them" - c-à-d, c'est une phrase adverbiale pour décrire "tracks".


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## Emma59

Je ne suis pas tout à fait sûre de comprendre. Que proposeriez-vous comme traduction ? Ou comme phrase plus claire en anglais pour expliquer "trailing red smears, the tracks preceded them" ?


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## mgarizona

frog1gsu said:


> "trailing red smears" (quoique ça manque de sens pour moi) appartient ici à "the tracks preceded them" - c-à-d, c'est une phrase adverbiale pour décrire "tracks".



Which is what I said above, in #4. It's simple apposition. ... Footprints are a type of track, but they are not the only thing that is a track. Wolff uses words in a very deliberate and literary fashion, and needs to be read in that light.


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## Emma59

Then "Ils suivirent les trainées rouges, laissant les autres traces derrière eux", is it that meaning ?


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## frog1gsu

Emma59 said:


> Je ne suis pas tout à fait sûre de comprendre. Que proposeriez-vous comme traduction ? Ou comme phrase plus claire en anglais pour expliquer "trailing red smears, the tracks preceded them" ?



"traînant des traces rouges (ce qui manque de sens, d'accord), les empreintes (des personnes/des animaux) leur précédaient"

Ou bien: The tracks, which preceded them, trailed red smears.


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## Ellea1

Suivant des traînées de sang, des empreintes les précédaient. (sounds weird)


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## Keith Bradford

Mot à mot : "les traces, qui laissaient trainer des taches rouges, les precedaient."

Donc, quelque chose du genre : "Ils suivirent les traces de pieds et les trainées rouges qui s'étalaient devant eux"


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## mgarizona

Emma59 said:


> Je ne suis pas tout à fait sûre de comprendre. Que proposeriez-vous comme traduction ? Ou comme phrase plus claire en anglais pour expliquer "trailing red smears, the tracks preceded them" ?



This will be terrible French I'm sure, but the idea is: Salissures/taches d'un rouge éstompé, les traces ...


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## mgarizona

They are not following footprints ... they are following red smears of blood on the ground ... the blood of the bear cub they find dead in the next sentence.


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## Emma59

Ok, at least I understand what the sentence means now ! Both of your suggestions sound good Ellea1 and Keith Bradford !


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## frog1gsu

Ellea1 said:


> Suivant des traînées de sang, des empreintes les précédaient. (sounds weird)



Vous avez raison, je crois - bof, c'est compliqué!!


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## Emma59

Are they tracks from the cub's paws maybe ? Maybe this will help : two paragraphs before, there's "heavy tracks and a dragging belly mark led up to the scramble of deepening red, and away. The tracks were nine inches long and showed claws"


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## frog1gsu

Qu'est-ce la phrase entière en anglais - sinon, nous ne savons pas à ce que se réfère "trailing red smears"..


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## Ellea1

Oh boy!

Inspectant les traces de sang, ils suivirent les empreintes.

Pistant les traces rouges, ils suivirent les empreintes.


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## Emma59

fro1gsu: "trailing red smears, the tracks preceded them" is the whole sentence.      Ellea1 : can "trail" mean "inspecter" in this context?


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## Ellea1

Not sure and I even start thinking that those tracks are trailed with red smears.  I believe I'm confused again.


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## frog1gsu

"Suivant les tâches rouges, les empreintes leur ont précédaient."

Ils suivirent les taches rouges, et les empreintes leur ont precedaient../s'étalaient devant eux.


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## Emma59

Since the blood comes from the cub and that the cub has been killed by a grizzly, is it possible that the red smears are those from the cub ("heavy tracks and a dragging belly) and the tracks that precede them come from the grizzly's paws ?


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## frog1gsu

Oui, c'est ça sans doute!! Bravo..


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## Emma59

Ok, then my last suggestion is "Ils suivirent les trainées rouges qui étaient précédées par des traces de pattes" (I develop "tracks") What do you think about this translation ? Does it sound good ?


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## frog1gsu

"Ils suivirent les trainees rouges, qui étaient précédées par des empreintes.." Je pense que c'est bon, oui.


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## mgarizona

I'll try one last time, it's really not that complicated: "trailing" is an adjective meaning "which trail along behind something". "Red" of course is also an adjective. Both words describe the smears of blood. In three simple words Wolff describes spilt blood as red smears trailing along the ground. These smears are the tracks which the father and son follow, the tracks that lead them to the dead bear cub. The OED defines 'tracks' as "_The mark, or series of marks, left by the passing of anything; a trail; a wheel-rut; the wake of a ship; a series of footprints; the scent followed by hound;_ etc." The "tracks" here are these "trails," the trails of blood left on the ground. There is nothing in this particular sentence that has anything to do with footprints. If you stop thinking about footprints, the sentence becomes quite clear. 

Now in French both a "trail of blood" and a "smear of blood" can translate "traînée de sang" ... maybe it would be easier to translate 'smeary red trails' than 'trailing red smears'? Something like "traînée rouge estompée"? ... It would also probably be easier to insert an apposition into a longer sentence in French, so instead of translating "Trailing red smears, the tracks preceded them. Within fifty feet they found the body." try translating "They followed the tracks, trailing red smears, about 50 feet and there they found the body."


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## Emma59

What you say makes sense. I'd need another English speaking person to tell what he/she thinks about that, just to be sure !


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## frog1gsu

Cela est sans doute correct - je crois que la difficulté résulte du fait que le sujet de "trailing" n'est pas donnée explicitement. Donc on a eu du mal à comprendre la relation entre la première phrase et la seconde. De toutes façons, je n'aime pas trop la phrase entière - en fait, elle pousse l'économie à ses limites!


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## Emma59

Ok ! Then one last question mgarizona : why do you suggest "estompée" ? For which word ? What do you think "une trainée de taches rouges" ?


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## Itisi

'how about 'longues trainées rouges' for 'trailing red smears' ?


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## Emma59

Yeah why not ! What do you think of "Des longues trainées rouges. Ils suivirent ces traces". (I want to keep something weird in French, as it is in English)


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## Itisi

de longues trainées rouges leur indiquaient le chemin ?


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## mgarizona

Estompée was my feeble attempt to render the sloppiness, the not-straight-lines-ness, that Wolff's use of 'smears' offers in English but which is lacking in "traînées rouges" ... a lack which 'longues' does nothing to address. ... I've seen 'pistes brouillée", can one say 'traînée brouillée'? ... It's just a part of the violence of the image; it suggests (to me anyway) that the cub was mortally wounded but not yet dead while being dragged away, was flopping from side to side. ... I see a photograph online captioned "Véhicule bleu avec une traînée bleue brouillée" so I'm going to pretend it's alright. 

You can decide such questions yourself. As for the structure of the sentence I prefer emma59's for its weirdness ... my head is saying "Des traînées rouges brouillées, c'étaient les traces qu'ils suivaient" ... or perhaps "qui s'étendaient devant eux" ... but my translation skills such as they are operate in the other direction. I'm just happy to see the sentence being read properly. Its "économie poussée à ses limites" which disturbs frog1gsu is precisely what inspires my fondness for it.


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## Itisi

I agree that 'longues' doesn't make it... 'Devant eux, des trainées rouges barbouillaient leur piste.'


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## Emma59

I don't think "brouillée" would be correct here. Maybe "Des longues trainées rouges irrégulières" or "des longues trainées de taches rouges" ("taches" for the sloppiness you talked about) ?


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## moustic

My suggestion:
Ils suivirent les empreintes qui laissaient de larges trainées rouges.


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## Uncle Bob

By the way "the tracks preceded them" is a bit silly - the tracks would be difficult to follow if they were behind them!


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## Emma59

Moustic: I think I'll use "large" instead of "longues", as you did, but I think I should use only one verb in the translation. Since the sentence in English is a bit weird/complex, I don't think I should improve it in French. Thank you !   Uncle Bob: Maybe it means that they are already following the tracks and that those tracks are now behind them? I don't know. Or how do you understand that passage?


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## Uncle Bob

I understand it as a redundancy (silly).


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## Emma59

That's what I thought too, and that's why I found it hard to translate it. I need to find something similar in French. The only thing I have is  "Ils suivirent les traces, de larges traînées rouges."


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## moustic

What about:
Devant eux des empreintes et de larges trainées rouges.


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## Emma59

Yes ! That's much better !  Thanks for this suggestion


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## Uncle Bob

If one accepts the consensus view on the meaning of "trailing" wouldn't it be "longues" rather than "larges"?


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## Emma59

Ok maybe. It's just because mgarizona mentioned the sloppiness of the tracks so I thought it'd be better. Would you rather say "longues" then?


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## Uncle Bob

Well, "trailing" means stretched out along the direction of the thing doing the trailing.


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## mgarizona

Interesting. Redundancy was actually behind my objection to 'longues' ... the length implied in 'trailing' is already implied in 'traînée' ... "Longue trace laissée sur le sol ou sur une surface par une substance répandue" (Robert) 

That's why I was looking for another adjective to express what Wolff expresses with his use of the word 'smear' ... basically one that conveys the opposite of 'nette.'

Something like "Devant eux, des traces, de brutes/floues traînées rouges."


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## Ellea1

What about?

Devant eux s'étalaient des traces barbouillées de rouge.


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