# un curieux chassé-croisé



## Icetrance

Hello,

Taken from an article in a magazine about Lefebvre.

_Selon un curieux chassé-croisé : alors que le monde s’appliquait à confirmer ses thèses, on ne lisait plus Lefebvre

_As is this bizarre back-and-forth mentality?

chassé-croisé (here) = contradiction (on va envers lui, et puis on s'en éloigne, et ce sans résultats et de façon continuelle). C'est un peu comme "Décidez-vous, vous l'aimez ou non?"


I'm not really sure of the meaning and would appreciate any help. I may be completely off the mark here.


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## mathilde70

I don't think the chassé-croisé is exactly a contradiction, they're going in opposite direction, but there is something fortuitous about the chassé-croisé.
People have integrated the theories but forgotten the author.


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## Wodwo

Since the opposing trajectories of author and theories are explained, I think most English speakers would just say, "*Ironically*, by the time everyone was busily confirming his theories, everyone had stopped reading Lefebvre". It's not the same, but it's doing the same job in highlighting the mismatch.


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## Itisi

'Paradoxically' ?


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## Wodwo

Yes, maybe "paradoxically", depending on context, or the writer's attitude, or both.


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## Icetrance

As per this back-and-forth attitude, .....

In other words, they have both interest and disinterest as regards Lefebvre (not reading his books, but yet trying to confirm his theses).

Thanks everyone


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## Itisi

If I read 'back and forth attitude', I would have no idea what it meant...


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## ManningAnne

I agree that 'back and forth attitude'  doesn't make sense to an English native.

The best options are Paradoxically or Ironically as already suggested.  ( I have a personal preference for Ironically, as it's a bit more common and fully conveys the meaning in this context)


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## Icetrance

Hi everyone!

I am native English speaker and "back-and-forth attitude" makes perfect sense to me, provided I understand the overall context here (perhaps I do not). It doesn't sound one iota as unnatural to me.  On one hand, you're pulling away from Lefebvre in not reading his books; but, at the same time, you're drawn to him in terms of wanting to prove his theses. Yes,  it's ironic indeed, but I don't care for it as a translation here.

Another example: _John always had a back-and-forth attitude about living in the countryside: in some regards, it was the cleanest way of life, but, in other ways, not so much so, as he still yearned for the cultural and social life of the big city. He simply couldn't have it both ways._


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## Wodwo

Icetrance I agree with your categorisation of a "back-and-forth attitude" (which sounds a bit clumsy to my native English-speaking ears, but which I would insantly understand). As you say, it would describe the attitude of someone who keeps changing their mind. This is not, however, the context in this thread, which is about the relationship between two different phenomena. On the one hand, Lefebvre's theses are being confirmed, presumably in the eyes of people who know what they are because they have read and appreciate Lefebvre; on the other, there is a general loss of interest in reading Lefebvre's writings. The groups involved in each of these phenomena are going to be different. Those who aren't interested in Lefebrvre aren't going to be the ones saying his theses are confirmed. So this is not a case of "a" back-and-forth attitude, but of two different attitudes. 

"Chassé croisé" describes a mismatch of two different movements.


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## moustic

To me "back and forth" suggests repeated movement to and fro. Here I think the _chassé-croisé _refers to just one reversal.
What about something with: _a curious reversal _... ?


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## Itisi

moustic said:


> To me "back and forth" suggests repeated movement to and fro. Here I think the _chassé-croisé _refers to just one reversa


I agree.

How about 'A curious switch in attitudes'?


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## Icetrance

Wodwo said:


> Icetrance I agree with your categorisation of a "back-and-forth attitude" (which sounds a bit clumsy to my native English-speaking ears, but which I would insantly understand). As you say, it would describe the attitude of someone who keeps changing their mind. This is not, however, the context in this thread, which is about the relationship between two different phenomena. On the one hand, Lefebvre's theses are being confirmed, presumably in the eyes of people who know what they are because they have read and appreciate Lefebvre; on the other, there is a general loss of interest in reading Lefebvre's writings. The groups involved in each of these phenomena are going to be different. Those who aren't interested in Lefebrvre aren't going to be the ones saying his theses are confirmed. So this is not a case of "a" back-and-forth attitude, but of two different attitudes.
> 
> "Chassé croisé" describes a mismatch of two different movements.



Thank you for your explanation.  It was very kind of you.

Perhaps I might go for: "*In a strange tangle of events....*"


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## broglet

Wodwo's "ironically" seems to me to hit the mark - or getting closer to the original "By a strange irony ... "

Itisi's "paradoxically" would suggest some kind of illogicality or contradiction, which is not in fact there, and neither "switch of attitudes" nor "back and forth attitude" seem appropriate to the current context.


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## Itisi

broglet said:


> "paradoxically" would suggest some kind of illogicality or contradiction, which is not in fact there


Paradox can be defined as "a statement that runs contrary to one's expectation." I would have thought that the statement we are talking about was one of those...?



Icetrance said:


> "*In a strange tangle of events....*"


I don't see 'a tangle of events' here...


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## broglet

Itisi said:


> Paradox can be defined as "a statement that runs contrary to one's expectation." I would have thought that the statement we are talking about was one of those...?


The situation under consideration doesn't seem to me to be contrary to any expectations, but rather an ironic coincidence.   There's no implication that anyone had been _expecting _people to carry on reading Lefebvre.


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## Itisi

Rightly or wrongly, I am not convinced, *broglet*.


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## Itisi

On the other hand, the author could have chosen 'paradoxically' and didn't.

How about 'Strangely enough'?


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## Itisi

On the other hand, the author could have chosen 'paradoxically' and didn't.

How about 'Strangely enough'?  Otherwise, I agree,


broglet said:


> Wodwo's "ironically" seems to me to hit the mark


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## Thomas Tompion

I'd be quite happy with_* ironically*_, or_* paradoxically*_, or _*by a strange reversal of fortune*_.


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## broglet

Hi Thomas, it doesn't seem to me to have anything to do with a reversal of fortune, strange or otherwise.


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## Thomas Tompion

broglet said:


> Hi Thomas, it doesn't seem to me to have anything to do with a reversal of fortune, strange or otherwise.


I must have misunderstood: I thought it meant that just as his theories came to be accepted, people stopped reading him.

As a writer one wants both to be persuasive and to have one's books leaping off the shelves.


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## ain'ttranslationfun?

"In a wry twist of fate" (too long?).


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## Itisi

ain'ttranslationfun? said:


> In a wry twist of fate


It's not a twist of fate, either...

Really, I think it just means 'It's funny that...''


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## broglet

I'm not so sure it isn't a wry twist of fate. It's certainly more of a twist of fate than a reversal of fortune.  But whether or not it is wry and, if so, just how wry it is, could be debated at some length.


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## ain'ttranslationfun?

broglet said:


> I'm not so sure it isn't a wry twist of fate. It's certainly more of a twist of fate than a reversal of fortune.  But whether or not it is wry and, if so, just how wry it is, could be debated at some length.



So, for you, would "As fate would have it..." work?


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## Itisi

Nothing to do with fate, really.  Nothing dramatic, just an observation.


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## broglet

ain'ttranslationfun? said:


> So, for you, would "As fate would have it..." work?


On further consideration I rather agree with Itisi that fate is not the issue. One usually talks about fate with reference to something undesirable happening.  The reference to _curieux chassé-croisé _was not a suggestion that anything was undesirable but merely an acknowledgement that two things were happening at the same time.  Not fate or fortune, just coincidence.


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## Wodwo

In that case, the very neutral "as it turned out" might do the job of drawing attention to the mismatch. But the overall context, which we don't have, would dictate the best way to deal with this. And might offer an opportunity for a gain in translation...


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## Itisi

prefer 'Ironically' to 'as it turned out', which is a little_ too_ neutral


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## Wodwo

Personally I don't think it is very meaningful to try to translate a sentence in isolation like this, given that we know it is actually part of an article. But the range of suggestions and discussion of them has been interesting. And having said that, and given that we do have only the one sentence to argue over, in the light of "curieux" I would also suggest "strangely" or "oddly".

Basically, depending on what is said in the rest of the article, anything that highlights the mismatch between how much Lefebvre was read and the uptake of his theories is potentially a go-er I would think. It then becomes the individual translator's job to make the choice in the light of the rest.

Chassé-croisé is always a bit tricky to translate, so with any luck people looking for ideas here will find inspiration....


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## ain'ttranslationfun?

"back-and-forth" for me is "ambivalent, wavering, vacillating".

If it's "coincidence", why not coincidentally"? Well, maybe because it doesn't sound very good... "As it happened"? That seems to lack the element of irony which I, unlike some other posters here, see in the comment "curieux chassé-croisé".


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## Itisi

Wodwo said:


> oddly


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