Ah! vous dirai-je, maman Lyrics
A French children's song with a very well-known tune: it is the melody we sing for Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star. The French words are a child's complaint to mother. Papa wants a sensible, grown-up child, but sweets seem worth more than good sense. Both languages are shown below.
Ah! vous dirai-je, maman
Ah! vous dirai-je maman,
Ce qui cause mon tourment!
Papa veut que je raisonne
Comme une grande personne;
Moi je dis que les bonbons
Valent mieux que la raison.
In English
Ah! shall I tell you, mother,
What is causing my trouble!
Papa wants me to reason
Like a grown-up person;
Me, I say that sweets
Are worth more than reason.
Printed from https://nurseryrhymes.co/ah-vous-dirai-je-maman/
- Type
- Action Songs
- Tune
- The Twinkle, Twinkle tune, sung lightly and a little cheekily
- Best for ages
- 3 to 9 years
What Does Ah! vous dirai-je, maman Mean?
The title means "Ah! shall I tell you, mother", and it is said roughly ah, voo dee-ray-zhuh, ma-mahn, with the last sound nasal. The child is confiding in mother about a "tourment", which here means a trouble. The trouble turns out to be small and funny. Papa wants the child to raisonner (to reason, to be sensible) "like a grown-up person". The child answers that les bonbons, the sweets, are worth more than la raison, reason.
The joke is that a child states, quite seriously, that sweets beat good sense. Younger children enjoy it because they agree. Older ones can say why Papa might see it differently, which makes a short talk about sense and treats.
If you know the tune of Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star, you already know this song: the French words fit the same melody. The same tune is also used for the English Alphabet song and for Baa, Baa, Black Sheep.
History and Origin
The melody is older than the words on this page. Reference works give 1761 as the year it was first published in France, and the same tune has been set to many songs since, in French and in English. The English poem Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star, by Jane Taylor, came out in 1806 in Rhymes for the Nursery, and it was later sung to this melody.
The French words here come from Vieilles chansons pour les petits enfants, a Paris collection of old songs with easy piano arrangements by the composer Charles-Marie Widor and pictures by Louis-Maurice Boutet de Monvel. Library and museum catalogues date its first edition to the 1880s. The song is six lines long, a single verse, and all six are given here.
Learning Activities
- Same tune, two songs: sing the first line of Twinkle, Twinkle, then the first line of the French song, and notice that the notes are the same.
- Sweets or sense: ask what Papa and the child would each say, and let two children argue it out in turn, one on each side.
- Listen for the French: say "bonbons" and "maman" together, slowly, then find other French words that children already know.
- Draw the complaint: make a picture of the child telling mother about the trouble, with a sweet in one hand.