Édith Piaf - Ça ira (English translation)

English

Translation

#12 3 4

We'll do it

(chorus)

We'll do it! We'll do it! We'll do it!1

Let's hang the Aristocrats !2

We'll do it! We'll do it! We'll do it!

The Aristocrats will be hanged!

For three hundred years they've been

promising to grant us some bread.

For three hundred years they've been

making merry and keeping whores!

For three hundred years we've been crushed.

Enough lies and smooth talk already!

We are no longer willing to starve!

(chorus)

For three hundred years they've been

waging war with fives and drums

while we were famished to death.

This could not go on forever...

For three hundred years they've been taking our men

and treating us like beasts of burden.

This could not go on forever !

(chorus)

Retribution is coming your way,

for the people is reclaiming its rights.

You really took us for a ride3

the ride is over, ye mighty kings!

You'll no longer lead us anywhere,

we will lead you to the scaffold,

for the law is now in our hands!4

(chorus)

1. This refers to Benjamin Franklin supporting the revolution using approximative French for "It will be alright"
2. lit. "the Aristocrats to the street lamp". Many Aristocrats and alleged Royalists were actually hanged from street lamps and/or beheaded by the crowd during French revolution.
3. the French plays on "se payer la tête de qqun" ("buy yourself someone's head") meaning "making fun of someone". The next lines go "Forget about relying on our heads, we'll have yours now"
4. lit. "for it's us who make the law now"