You lie like a dentist at a fair.

Wordsmith.org

>You lie like a dentist at a fair.

This expression is used by one of the characters in the English translation of "The Age of Reason" (1945) by Jean-Paul Sartre, translated by Eric Sutton (1962).

It gets zero Google-hits.

Maybe it's a literal translation of a French idiom. Any ideas as to why French dentists at fairs might embody the quiddity of dishonesty?

Can you give the original words? Maybe belMarduk could help.

maybe because they all advertized themselves as "painless"?

Good call, of troy. That's better than anything I've been able to come up with. I was thinking, maybe they'd formed some kind of conspiratorial cartel with candy floss salesmen! Part shares and part profits!

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Can you give the original words? Maybe belMarduk could help.

You mean in French? I'm reading the English translation.

Yes, I meant the French. But I got to thinking after my other post, that it may have the same sense as those charlatans who used to travel around the countryside (Edit: often with circuses or fairs) selling fake elixirs.

I agree. The French lanugage has a very limited vocabulary compared to English.
In translating this expression, "dentist" may be a bit loose and refers to a broad category of "circus-like charlatans".

In translating this expression, "dentist" may be a bit loose and refers to a broad category of "circus-like charlatans"

I'm not sure about small vocabularies, but French dentiste seems to cover most of the meaning of English dentist. Under the entry for mentir 'to lie' I did find: Mentir comme un arracheur de dents. An arracheur des dents would be a tooth-puller, and the saying seems to be a proverb of sorts. "Loc. proverbiale. [P. allus. � l'insinc�rit� des arracheurs de dents affirmant que l'op�ration ne fera pas mal] Mentir comme un arracheur de dents." I did notice that English fair does not come into it.

Googling around makes me think that tooth drawer may be a better translation of arracheur des dents.

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Googling around makes me think that tooth drawer may be a better translation of arracheur des dents.

That'd be the dresser drawer you keep your teeth in at night?

That'd be the dresser drawer you keep your teeth in at night?

I keep 'em in a glass of fizzy water on the nightstand. But, yeah, you get the idear.

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>You lie like a dentist at a fair.

This expression is used by one of the characters in the English translation of "The Age of Reason" (1945) by Jean-Paul Sartre, translated by Eric Sutton (1962).

It gets zero Google-hits.

Maybe it's a literal translation of a French idiom. Any ideas as to why French dentists at fairs might embody the quiddity of dishonesty?

Something that is interesting to me is that the book, when looked up in French the book is listed as:

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Les Chemins de la Liberte I: L'Age de Raison

which when translated into the English language becomes:

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WAYS OF FREEDOM/1. The AGE OF REASON

In light of this mistake on something as simple as the title of the book, it stands to prove, to me at least, that the book contents are misquoted as well. Thus in my mind, the only way to truly know what the actual saying or proverb truly is and the implied meaning there of, is to get the original work, read it or have some one who can read French peruse it and explain the exact word usage, then go from there. (I know, bad run on sentence, but I do not care today.)

Just a thought.

The literalness of a translaton is no measure of its accuracy. Huge numbers of book (and movie) titles have been translated into something completely different and thus, generally more apt. Anyone like to post some good examples?

The third book of Sartre's The Roads to Freedom trilogy is "La mort dans l'�me" which my one semester of French tells me is something like "The death in the heart". English language editions are usually titled "Troubled Sleep" or sometimes "Iron in the Soul".

I was going to tell us all about Cinderella's glass slipper originally being a fur slipper in French.

glass = verre
fur = vair

Only it appears that the mistranslation info is no longer accepted. Or the problem goes back to when the story was transmitted orally. Or ...

I always thought it was a GRASS slipper!

(or is that a Grass Skirt?)

As the prince grabs and pulls fists full, shouting, "She loves me, she loves me not."

The literalness of a translation is no measure of its accuracy - You have my emphatic agreement here. The "tooth drawer" example is a graphic illustration of this fact. I would have opted for "fairground dentist".

Hydra, can you tell me what chapter and where about in the chapter the "lie like a dentist at a fair" phrase was? I have a French reading co-worker who might have access to the French original this weekend and we might find out what it was translated from.

Quote:

>You lie like a dentist at a fair.

This expression is used by one of the characters in the English translation of "The Age of Reason" (1945) by Jean-Paul Sartre, translated by Eric Sutton (1962).

It gets zero Google-hits.

Maybe it's a literal translation of a French idiom. Any ideas as to why French dentists at fairs might embody the quiddity of dishonesty?

Hydra,I consulted a French online Dictionnaire on this, asking:
mentir comme un dentiste a la foire on which they gave:
To lie like a dentist with (!)

the fair
(but anyway the dictionnaire accepted the question as a standing expression.)

Obviously is it poorly translated , but quite directly from the idiom and it sure has to do with the charlatans and demi- charlatans in the old days performing operations and teeth pulling at fairs as seen in 16 th and 17 th century paintings- Breughel and Jan Steen a.s.
The dishonesty was international. As was, is and will be.

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Hydra, can you tell me what chapter and where about in the chapter the "lie like a dentist at a fair" phrase was?

In the Penguin edition translated by Eric Sutton (1962) it's found in Chapter 9, at the bottom of page 134. Chapter 9 has 12 pages. Page 134 is the 10th page.

Does that help?

Oh, and for context, it's said by Daniel (who is prowling a "Fair" on the Boulevard de Sebastopol where male prostitutes hang out) to Bobby, a male prostitute. Daniel says it when Bobby tells him a sob-story and begs for money.

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Hydra,I consulted a French online Dictionnaire on this, asking:
mentir comme un dentiste a la foire on which they gave:
To lie like a dentist with (!) the fair
(but anyway the dictionnaire accepted the question as a standing expression.)

Obviously is it poorly translated , but quite directly from the idiom and it sure has to do with the charlatans and demi- charlatans in the old days performing operations and teeth pulling at fairs as seen in 16 th and 17 th century paintings- Breughel and Jan Steen a.s.
The dishonesty was international. As was, is and will be.

Thanks BranShea. The evidence is stacking up.

Maybe amateur dentists were in the past what used car salesmen are today.

So I did the once for all thing: I called my French friend Ginette at Niort, France. The meaning is what it seemed to be from the beginning , but the genuine French expression, no longer used in today's speach is: "Mentir comme un arracheur de dents".

Translation: "To lie like a tooth jerker"
It dates from the days when the word dentiste was not yet in use.

I'm not sure if today's dentists are completely free from deceiving actions like their free style predecessors. Sometimes advising expensive treatments which are maybe not that
necessairy.
(hope not to offensive possible dentists at the board, who of course would never be like that).

how was your last haircut?

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how was your last haircut?

Free style.

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So I did the once for all thing: I called my French friend Ginette at Niort, France. The meaning is what it seemed to be from the beginning , but the genuine French expression, no longer used in today's speach is: "Mentir comme un arracheur de dents". Translation: "To lie like a tooth jerker" It dates from the days when the word dentiste was not yet in use.

I'm not sure if today's dentists are completely free from deceiving actions like their free style predecessors. Sometimes advising expensive treatments which are maybe not that
necessairy. (hope not to offensive possible dentists at the board, who of course would never be like that).

Wow! You really pulled out all the stops!

Thanks.

(I hope that was a collect call!)

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how was your last haircut?

Ho! you watchbird in the woods! This is from Wikipedia:

The barbers of former times were also surgeons and dentists. Most early physicians disdained surgery, and therefore, as well as haircutting, hairdressing and shaving, barbers performed surgery of wounds, blood-letting, cupping and leeching, enemas, and the extraction of teeth. Thus they were called barber surgeons and they formed their first organisation in 1094.

So your haircut remark can pass on for fitting in the setting of this thread. I didn't know what it meant
anyway, but there sure is something fishy about that remark

No, Hydra ,thanks, it was nice to talk with her anyway.

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how was your last haircut?

Ho! you watchbird in the woods! This is from Wikipedia:

The barbers of former times were also surgeons and dentists. Most early physicians disdained surgery, and therefore, as well as haircutting, hairdressing and shaving, barbers performed surgery of wounds, blood-letting, cupping and leeching, enemas, and the extraction of teeth. Thus they were called barber surgeons and they formed their first organisation in 1094.

So your haircut remark can pass on for fitting in the setting of this thread. I didn't know what it meant
anyway, but there sure is something fishy about that remark

No, Hydra ,thanks, it was nice to talk with her anyway.

Wow.
I just can't imagine my Dentist giving me an enema!!

Long as he does your teeth first.

Course, you don't know what he's done with the last patient.