Please translate this quote. I have asked several native french
speakers without definite response. I can make a direct translation,
of course, of all the words, but it doesn't really hang together very
well. Does it mean "without the leberty to blame there is no
flattering praise"? Seems awkward.  I expect a sort of idiomatic
translation. And why would it be a slogan for the newspaper, besides
the fact that Beaumarchais wrote the story of "Figaro"?

The quote, by the way, is just beneath the banner on the top of the
first page of "FIGARO"   « Sans la liberté de blâmer, il n'est point
d'éloge flatteur » ( Beaumarchais).

Thank you

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Request for Question Clarification by markj-ga on 15 Jan 2005 17:01 PST

legoff --

I do not speak or read French, but I have approached your question by
taking the obvious equivalents of a few of the words and using Google
searches to find an English explanation of the Beaumarchais quote.  I
have found one, and if this would be a satisfactory response to your
question, please let me know and I will post it in the answer box:

"As for the limitations on the liberty of the press: 'They tell me,' says
Figaro, 'that if in my writing I will mention neither the government,
nor public worship, nor politics, nor morals, nor people in office, nor
influential corporations, nor the Opera, nor the other theatres, nor
anybody that belongs to anything, I may print everything freely, subject
to the approval of two or three censors.' 'How I should like to get hold
of one of those people that are powerful for a few days, and that give
evil orders so lightly, after a good reverse of favor had sobered him of
his pride! I would tell him, that foolish things in print are important
only where their circulation is interfered with; that without freedom to
blame, no praise is flattering, and that none but little men are afraid
of little writings.'"

LitHead: The Eve of the French Revolution, by Edward J. Lowell: Chapter 20
http://64.233.161.104/search?q=cache:_7PG-LlSNiMJ:www.lithead.com/show_section/Lowell,-Edward-J./Eve-of-the-French-Revolution,-The/-Chapter-20/

In even plainer English, what is meant by the quote is that if
criticism ("blame") is suppressed by governmental censorship, then
praise cannot be "flattering" because it cannot be assumed to be
genuine.

Again, I am not basing this information on a knowledge of French
idioms, but on a persuasive (to me) English-language explanation.

Let me know if it will suffice as an answer.

Finally, I should note that the link above is intended to be a direct
link to the page where the quoted material is found.  I was only able
to do that by using a link to the page as cached by Google.  If you
have trouble accessing it, I can link you to the first page of the
book and help you navigate to the page in question on the LitHead
website.

markj-ga

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Clarification of Question by legoff-ga on 15 Jan 2005 17:15 PST

Thank you Mark, please proceed and post your response as an "answer",
it seems to suffice for my purposes.
Legoff

legoff --

Thanks for your clarification. I am happy to be able to get the
information for you so promptly.

As I intimated in my earlier posting, I used Google searches to find
the responsive information.  This one was the most useful:

"freedom to blame" beaumarchais
://www.google.com/search?sourceid=navclient&ie=UTF-8&rls=GGLD,GGLD:2004-01,GGLD:en&q=%22freedom+to+blame%22+beaumarchais


To make the answer "official," here is the relevant portion of my
clarification request:

I do not speak or read French, but I have approached your question by
taking the obvious equivalents of a few of the words and using Google
searches to find an English explanation of the Beaumarchais quote.  I
have found one, and if this would be a satisfactory response to your
question, please let me know and I will post it in the answer box:

"As for the limitations on the liberty of the press: 'They tell me,' says
Figaro, 'that if in my writing I will mention neither the government,
nor public worship, nor politics, nor morals, nor people in office, nor
influential corporations, nor the Opera, nor the other theatres, nor
anybody that belongs to anything, I may print everything freely, subject
to the approval of two or three censors.' 'How I should like to get hold
of one of those people that are powerful for a few days, and that give
evil orders so lightly, after a good reverse of favor had sobered him of
his pride! I would tell him, that foolish things in print are important
only where their circulation is interfered with; that without freedom to
blame, no praise is flattering, and that none but little men are afraid
of little writings.'"

LitHead: The Eve of the French Revolution, by Edward J. Lowell: Chapter 20
http://64.233.161.104/search?q=cache:_7PG-LlSNiMJ:www.lithead.com/show_section/Lowell,-Edward-J./Eve-of-the-French-Revolution,-The/-Chapter-20/

In even plainer English, what is meant by the quote is that if
criticism ("blame") is suppressed by governmental censorship, then
praise cannot be "flattering" because it cannot be assumed to be
genuine.


markj-ga

Perfect answers. Thank you.

Hiya. I am French and can confirm the above. If you were not allowed
negative criticism (blame) towards the government institutions,
possibly through repression or plain censorship, then positive
critisism (praise), if it ever happened, could not be taken seriously
by the governemnt themselves. If you can't be negative (because it's
banned) nor positive (because it's doesn't look genuine), then what's
left for a journalist to do?