“Minha vida” (Rita Lee, 2001)
Source: Marco Senche from Araçatuba, Brasil, CC BY-SA 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons
In honor of what would have been Rita Lee’s 77th birthday today, a threefold translation: Below are the Portuguese lyrics to Rita Lee’s cover of the Beatles’ song “In my life” followed by my translation of those lyrics and then the original English lyrics. (I did something similar with a Seu Jorge song a while back.)
“Minha vida” (Rita Lee)
Tem lugares que me lembram
Minha vida, por onde andei
As histórias, os caminhos
O destino que eu mudei
Cenas do meu filme em branco e preto
Que o vento levou e o tempo traz
Entre todos os amores e amigos
De você me lembro mais
Tem pessoas que a gente
Não esquece nem se esquecer
O primeiro namorado
Uma estrela da TV
Personagens do meu livro de memórias
Que um dia rasguei do meu cartaz
Entre todas as novelas e romances
De você me lembro mais
Desenhos que a vida vai fazendo
Desbotam alguns, uns ficam iguais
Entre corações que tenho tatuados
De você me lembro mais
De você, não esqueço jamais
“My life” (trans. by S. Smith)
There are places that remind me of
My life, of where I wandered
The stories, the paths
The destiny that I changed
Scenes from my black and white film
Gone with the wind and brought by time
Among all the loves and friends
You I remember most
There are people that we
Don’t forget, not even forgetting
The first boyfriend
A TV star
Characters from my memory book
That one day I ripped from my billboard
Among all the soaps and novels
You I remember most
Drawings that life keeps making
Some come undone, some stay the same
Among hearts that I have tattooed
You I remember most
You I’ll never forget
“In my life” (The Beatles, 1965)
There are places I'll remember
All my life though some have changed
Some forever not for better
Some have gone and some remain
All these places had their moments
With lovers and friends I still can recall
Some are dead and some are living
In my life I've loved them all
But of all these friends and lovers
There is no one compares with you
And these memories lose their meaning
When I think of love as something new
Though I know I'll never lose affection
For people and things that went before
I know I'll often stop and think about them
In my life I love you more