メリー・ポピンズ リターンズ

今日から公開が始まるメリー・ポピンズ リターンズ。字幕では「私の教育が甘かったかしら」となっているところでWould have hoped I taught you better.と仮定法が使われていました。

Michael Banks: Mary…

Jane Banks: Poppins. You came back.

Michael Banks: you seemed hardly to have aged at all.

Mary Poppins: Really, one never discusses a women’s age, Michael. Would have hoped I taught you better.

上映早々、映画の本編の一部を取り上げてしまい恐縮ですが、英語学習的に興味深いネタでもあるので劇中歌のTrip a Little Light Fantasticを紹介させてもらいます。

4分58秒あたりからCockney rhyming slangが登場します。以下は歌詞から抜粋しました。映画ではLeerie=lamplighterたちの話し方だとしていますね。

[ANGUS] Come along, join us in a bit of a kick and prance

[JOHN] What did he say?

[JACK] Kick and prance -- it means "dance"! It's leerie speak. You don't say the words you mean, you say something that rhymes, only -- here, I'll show you how it works. Angus, give us your weep and wail. To the rest of ya, that means"tale"

[ANGUS] I was short of a sheet

[JACK]

It was in the street

[ANGUS] Just a tumble down a sink

[JACK] Just to get himself a drink

[ANGUS] Then I pinch what's fatter

[JACK] He grabbed his ladder

[ANGUS] To smile and smirk-

[JACK and ANGUS] To work!

以前、翻訳の先生からお話を伺ったことを受け売りさせてもらうだけですが。。。Cockney rhyming slangでは、Bread and Honeyがmoney、Wind and KiteがWeb site、5ポンドのFiverがLady Godivaのように音の似た別の単語が使われることがあるようです。

Cockney rhyming slangの辞書サイトのようなところでは以下のようなものがトップ10になっていました。それぞれが何の語を指しているか考えてみるのも楽しそうです。

TOP 10 CLASSIC RHYMING SLANG

Apples and Pears 

Kettle and Hob 

Adam and Eve 

Butcher's Hook 

Barnet Fair 

Jack Jones 

Trouble and Strife 

A la Mode 

Ruby Murray 

Dog and Bone 

この映画のすごいところは日本語吹き替え版では日本語の歌にもなっているところです。日本語バージョンでは、響きが似ている別の言葉を言う遊びになっていて、タンス＝ダンス、からし＝話し、位置＝道と耳で聞いても楽しめるよう工夫されていました。

映画に水をさすようになってしまって申し訳ないですが、Slateの記事では映画で取り上げているCockney rhyming slangは聞いたことがなく、本場のものとは違うと批判していました。インタビューではリサーチ不足ではと語っていましたが、全世界に向けての子供向け映画なので、そこらへんは通りのいいわかりやすい語に変えてしまったのでしょうかねえ。映画ではdanceはkick and pranceとしていますが、辞書サイトではdanceの言い換えは米国俳優のJack Palanceでした。これだと知らない人には何だかわかりづらいですから。

Mary Poppins Returns and the Disneyfication of Working-Class London

An interview with a Pearly Queen about cockney rhyming slang, Lin-Manuel Miranda’s accent, and more.

By MARISSA MARTINELLI DEC 28, 20182:28 PM

Sure.

You listen to him, he speaks Estuary cockney. Ray Winstone and Michael Caine, they speak proper cockney like what I do. I thought Lin was very, very sweet. He was very sweet in his portrayal. It’s just that he was going from cockney to a bit posh, pronouncing his words. I’d be really interested to see who worked with him, with his language. And the rhyming slang’s terrible.

I was going to ask you about that. Is it that bad?

Oh, Marissa. I don’t know where they got theirs, but I’ll give you a blast on proper rhyming slang. This is a little bit I wrote, so I’ll read you this. This is what proper rhyming slang is:

I took me loaf off the weeping, got out me Uncle Ned, put me Scotch eggs on the floor, put me “round the houses” on, then me dickie dirt with me Peckham Rye, put me almonds on, then me barefoots, went down the apples, got me cherry, went for a ball down the frog to the rub-a-dub for a pint of pig’s.

I … did not follow any of that.

No, you wouldn’t. Cockneys would.

I took me loaf (loaf of bread, head) off the weeping (weeping willow, pillow), got out me Uncle Ned (bed), put me Scotch eggs (legs) on the floor, put me “round the houses” on (round the houses, trousers), then me dickie dirt (shirt) with me Peckham Rye (tie), put me almonds on (almond rocks, socks), then me barefoots (barefoot blues, shoes), went down the apples (apples and pears, stairs), got me cherry (cherry hog, dog), went for a ball (ball of chalk, walk) down the frog (frog and toad, road) to the rub-a-dub (pub) for a pint of pig’s (pig’s ear, beer).

The rhyming slang they were using [in Mary Poppins Returns], I have never heard of those ones.

You’ve never heard of “weep and wail” or “short of a sheet”?

Weep and wail, yeah. Weep and wail was tale. I’ve heard of some of them, but they are very, very obscure. Some I think they made them up. I mean, the ones that I said to you there, this is how we talk proper. I do appreciate they’ve done a lovely production, but I just wish that they had consulted maybe proper old Londoners.

If he’d gone to some proper cockney, like me, we’d have got a bit more background. I don’t know who their researcher was, but the cockney rhyming slang was invented in 1814, by costermongers, that being market traders. I mean, the “leeries” were likely Scottish. I don’t know who done their research! I’ve never heard of leeries. We used gaslights in London, but the leeries was Scottish, I think. Scottish lamplighters.

映画では街灯点灯夫のことをleerieと呼んでいるのですが、これについてもthe “leeries” were likely Scottish. I don’t know who done their research! I’ve never heard of leeries. We used gaslights in London, but the leeries was Scottish, I think. Scottish lamplighters.とスコットランドの言葉ではないかと言っています。確かにウエブサイトの検索でもスコットランドの言葉として紹介しているものがありました。

Scots Word Of The Season: ‘Leerie’

By Maggie Scott

Leerie n. a lamplighter, who lit gas lamps in towns and cities (before electric light)

The word leerie is perhaps best known nowadays from the nostalgic poem ‘The Lamplighter’ by Robert Louis Stevenson (1850-1894). The character, ‘Leerie’, is depicted as a romantic wanderer who charms the imagination of the child-narrator, trapped behind the window of his house in the evening dusk and musing on ambition:

Now Tom would be a driver and Maria go to sea,

And my papa’s a banker and as rich as he can be;

But I, when I am stronger and can choose what I’m to do,

O Leerie, I’ll go round at night and light the lamps with you!

（中略）

The oldest known evidence for use of the term leerie is found in an article from The Scotchman, a short-lived Scots newspaper of the early nineteenth century, where we read that ‘the Scotsman may lang be the leery o his countramen’s min’s’ (1812). As a point of interest, the paper ran only briefly, from 1812-1813, and was published by John Mennons, who in 1783 initiated publication of the Glasgow Advertiser, now better known as The Herald. 

（後略）

歌に関しては、実際のスラングとは違うかもしれまえんが、音遊びを楽しむにはもってこいです。英語学習の音声面は発音などに限定されやすいですが、こんなような触れ方があっていいですよね。そのような方向性で作られた教材がネット上にありました。