Test your French with Victor Hugo
A little French poetry – and a lesson in humanity
This is one of my favourite poems by Victor Hugo, and although it is quite a challenge for anyone learning French, I think its message is every bit as powerful today as when it was written.
Après la bataille (After the Battle) tells a simple but remarkable story. A father, riding across a battlefield, comes across a wounded enemy soldier who is desperately asking for water. Moved by compassion, he asks his faithful cavalryman to give the man a drink. But just as the soldier bends down to help, the wounded man attempts to shoot the father.
Despite having just been betrayed, the father simply repeats his instruction: “Give him a drink anyway.”
That final line has always stayed with me. It is a wonderful reminder that kindness does not have to depend on how others treat us, and that we don’t always have to answer hostility with hostility, or repay cruelty with cruelty. There is a quiet strength in choosing compassion over revenge, a timely lesson for the world we live in today.
France’s answer to Shakespeare, Victor Hugo was amongst other things, a poet, playwright, philosopher and author.
Many a Bac (equivalent of A-Levels) student has quivered at the sight of his name on the test paper…
How will you fare?
Useful vocab
sourire – smile
doux – gentle
Suivi – followed
housard – cavalry man
Parcourait à cheval – was travelling on horseback
Il lui sembla – he seemed to
l’ombre – the shadow
en déroute – defeated
sanglant – bloody, bleeding
Râlant – groaning, moaning
brisé – broken
ému – moved
tendit – held out
qui pendait – hanging
sa selle – his saddle
blessé – wounded man
Tout à coup – suddenly
Saisit – grabbed
il étreignait – he was clutching
vise – aims
front – forehead
Le coup – the shot
un écart en arrière – jumped back
quand même – anyway