The first thoughts that came to mind upon learning that sera is the third-person singular future tense of être were the lines of the song “Que Sera Sera” from the Hitchcock movie seen a long time ago.
I was quite sure that the words “que sera sera” was in French till a Facebook friend put the song on her wall. Just to confirm I checked up the Wikipedia and to my surprise I found that nobody is quite sure which language this is in. Spanish? Italian? Nah!
Given the confusion, I shall stick to my version that que sera sera is in French. Que = what; sera = will be. So, this becomes, “what will be, will be.” I think the confusion comes from the line of the song that follows que sera sera, which goes: “whatever will be, will be.” I like to think that the “ever” in “whatever” is there to get the rhyme properly. The last line of each stanza gets it right though: “what will be, will be.”
Here enjoy the song:
The only problem with my version of que sera sera? The pronunciation of the word 'que' is French is not 'kay'. Oh well, Hollywood might have got it wrong!
I was quite sure that the words “que sera sera” was in French till a Facebook friend put the song on her wall. Just to confirm I checked up the Wikipedia and to my surprise I found that nobody is quite sure which language this is in. Spanish? Italian? Nah!
Given the confusion, I shall stick to my version that que sera sera is in French. Que = what; sera = will be. So, this becomes, “what will be, will be.” I think the confusion comes from the line of the song that follows que sera sera, which goes: “whatever will be, will be.” I like to think that the “ever” in “whatever” is there to get the rhyme properly. The last line of each stanza gets it right though: “what will be, will be.”
Here enjoy the song:
The only problem with my version of que sera sera? The pronunciation of the word 'que' is French is not 'kay'. Oh well, Hollywood might have got it wrong!
I think you only read a portion of the Wikipedia article, the phrase is a misunderstanding of spanish grammar. In spanish it would need to be "Lo que será, será" - in french it should be "Ce qui sera, sera".
ReplyDeleteTout ce qui sera sera.
DeleteThank you for correcting me. I will check the entry in Wikipedia once more.
ReplyDeleteI've studied both Spanish and a little French. Que is what in Spanish. Sera is the future tense so "will be" is correct (also in Spanish). "What" in French is Quoi, not Que. It would be pronounced 'Kwah' if it was French, but since it's Spanish, the pronunciation is actually okay :]
ReplyDeleteWhile «quoi» does mean "what", the use of «que» in «que sera, sera» would be correct, were it French. I do not believe «quoi sera, sera» would make sense. AFAICS, were it not for the pronunciation, the line would be perfectly acceptable French.
Delete«Que» often takes the place of the word "what" in English; for example, «Qu'est-ce que c'est ?» means "What is it?"; «Que fais-tu ?» - "What are you doing?" et cetera.
Mòran tàing.
In French que & quoi are not followed by verbs (they are not subjects) - so, qui must be used with sera. If you just "Qui sera, sera" it would mean "Who will be, will be" but if you add "Ce" > "Ce qui sera sera" you've got it! Sort of a "that which will be, will be
ReplyDeleteIt’s exactly the same in Portuguese
ReplyDeleteC’est sera sera is what I hear. Is that correct?
ReplyDelete