كان غائبا في الشراب

I

Interprete

Senior Member
French, France
Hello,

I bumped into the following sentence: وكان زوجها غائبا في الشراب (her husband was away drinking)
Can I generalise كان في to mean 'to be doing something' ?

Thanks
 
    • Interesting. The translation I provided actually comes from a translation manual whose author is a Lebanese professor of translation, whose point in giving this example was to illustrate the difference between the French and the Arab way of expressing ideas (absent en train de boire - many specific words to describe one idea in French vs. غائب في الشراب much more concise in Arabic).

    Apparently the sentence comes from Kalila and Dimna but I can't seem to find it when I google it...
     
    I understand that you don't have further context, seeing that this is just a separate sentence used as an example in your book, and context is very important here, but I still don't think this means that he was "absent en train de boire".
    And I don't think this is from Kalila wa dimna, as the characters of the book are all animals unless they're personnified enough to go drinking. :)
     
    Thank you Cherine, and when I type the whole Arabic sentence in google, the only exact match comes from the online version of the translation manual I'm referring to :)
     
    Thanks, his name is Joseph N. Hajjar, or in Arabic جوزف نعوم حجّار and his book is titled " دراسة في أصول الترجمة / Traité de traduction"...
     
    Salut,

    Est-ce que l'auteur dit que le "était en train de" viendrait de la structure "kâna fî + masdar" ? Parce que j'aurais plutôt pensé que cela viendrait de la structure "kâna + sujet + ism fâ'il" (participe actif) tout comme la structure "sujet + ism fâ'il" pourrait correspondre à un présent actuel.
     
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    I do not have my books with me at the moment, but it rings a bell. It is in the story of the shoemaker and his unfaithful wife, sub-story in الأسد والثور. It is about how a wife meets up with her lover while her husband is away drinking with his friends. The story is missing in the censored editions.


    PS. I have found it now in ʽAzzām’s edition of Kalīla wa Dimna:

    وتخبره أن الإسكاف غائب فى الشرب وأنه لا يرجع إلا ممسيا وهو سكران
     
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    Fdb, thanks for providing the source.
    Do you mean that غائب في الشراب (or is it الشرب?) does indeed mean "away drinking"? Is it, to your knowledge, a common/correct structure? :confused:
     
    cherine said:
    Fdb, thanks for providing the source.
    Do you mean that غائب في الشراب (or is it الشرب?) does indeed mean "away drinking"? Is it, to your knowledge, a common/correct structure? :confused:
    Click to expand...

    I am not sure whether this is idiomatic or not, or (more to the point) whether it was idiomatic in the 2nd century h. The manuscripts of K.w.D. all differ radically from one another, and most modern editors have felt empowered to “correct” the text however they like. The text from the edition by ʽAzzām (with الشرب not الشراب) has been quoted above. Cheikho’s critical edition (not his censored “school edition”) has:

    وتخبره أن زوجها عند أصحابه وأنه لا يرجع إلا سكران

    Many years ago I copied out this story from a very good old manuscript, which has:

    فأن زوجها عند أصحابه فى شراب وأنه لا يرجع إلا سكران

    The meaning is perfectly clear from the context: the shoemaker’s wife waits for her husband to go out drinking and then meets up with her lover. The story is substantially the same in the Sanskrit and Syriac versions.
     
    fdb said:
    I do not have my books with me at the moment, but it rings a bell. It is in the story of the shoemaker and his unfaithful wife, sub-story in الأسد والثور. It is about how a wife meets up with her lover while her husband is away drinking with his friends. The story is missing in the censored editions.


    PS. I have found it now in ʽAzzām’s edition of Kalīla wa Dimna:

    وتخبره أن الإسكاف غائب فى الشرب وأنه لا يرجع إلا ممسيا وهو سكران
    Click to expand...

    The following, censored version, is in the 1922 Beirut publication (page 77)

    وكان بين المرأة و زوجة دجل حجّام صداقة فارسلت الیھا تدعوها لوليمة وتخبرها ان زوجها عند اصحابه وانّه لا یرجع الّا سکران في منتصف الّیل۔​

    Cheikho’s 1905 edition has the following (page 66).

    و قد کانت امرأته عشقت رجلاً و کان الرّسول فیما بینھما امرأۃ رجل حجّام۔ فأرسلت امراۃ الاسکاف الی امرٔۃ الحجّام ان تأتي خلیلھا وتخبرہ ان

    زوجھا عند اصحابه و انه لا یرجع الّا سکران ممسّیاً۔
    ​
    In another version published in Egypt, we have the following.

    وکان لامرأة الإسكاف صديق قد عَلِقها وعِلقته، وكان الرسول فيما بينهما امرأةُ َّ لها، فأرسلت امرأة الإسكاف إلى امرأة الحجام، فأمرتها أن تأتي

    صديقها وتخبره أن الإسكاف غائب في الشرب، وأنه لا يرجع إلا ممسيًا وهو سكران۔​
     
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