Ne Me Quitte Pas
Regular price
€80.99
A01=Maya Angela Smith
adaptation
affect
Author_Maya Angela Smith
breakup songs
Category=AVC
Category=AVLP
Category=JBSL
Category=NHTB
covering
Dame Shirley Bassey
eq_art-fashion-photography
eq_bestseller
eq_history
eq_isMigrated=1
eq_isMigrated=2
eq_music
eq_nobargain
eq_non-fiction
eq_society-politics
Francophone
gender
Jacques Brel
Nina Simone
race
translation
Product details
- ISBN 9781478028253
- Weight: 363g
- Dimensions: 178 x 178mm
- Publication Date: 25 Feb 2025
- Publisher: Duke University Press
- Publication City/Country: US
- Product Form: Hardback
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In 1959, Belgian singer-songwriter Jacques Brel wrote and performed “Ne me quitte pas” (Don’t leave me), a visceral and haunting plea for his lover to come back. As a teenager, Maya Angela Smith was so captivated by Nina Simone’s powerful 1965 cover of the song that it inspired her to be a French professor. In Ne me quitte pas, Smith follows the classic song’s long and varied journey, from Brel’s iconic 1966 performance on French television to Simone’s cover to Shirley Bassey’s English-language version (“If You Go Away”) to its contemporary manifestations in popular culture. Throughout, Smith shows that as the song travels across languages, geographies, genres, and generations, it accumulates shifting artistic and cultural significance as each listener creates their own meaning.
Maya Angela Smith is Professor of French in the French and Italian Studies Department at the University of Washington.
