Lyric discussion by tommybok 

Cover art for Désenchantée lyrics by Mylene Farmer

True indeed Isac. One of the things I've learned over the years is that it is dangerous for others to speak about the meaning of an artist's work. Be it a painting, sculpture, or song. Those presumptuous to regurgitate what others believe the work to be, denies any intention of the artist to allow us to each have their own personal interpretation of what something is/means. And after all, isn't the meaning of something to someone personally all that truly matters to the artist? That they have taken a piece of work from the artist and made it have personal meaning to themselves and their lives. I don't think any artist could have more honor bestowed on them by anyone than a work having meaning to someone other than themselves?

I do offer up a video posted by Алексей Петров on You Tube that I think would hit the meaning closest to the mark. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XazOkXRTyR4

For those of us old enough to remember life in the 1980's when the Soviet Union still existed and controlled parts of Central Europe and Eastern Europe this video brings back memories of things we wish we could forget on both sides of the iron curtain. Gulags, hunger, needless suffering, Stazi turning automatic weapons on their own people to prevent them from escaping to the West and freedom. In the West (the US, Canada and the western European countries, Australia and NZ), we had freedom and proved pretty much we could beat the Soviets at everything. The 1980 Olympic Ice Hockey match, were a bunch of American kids beat a Soviet professional team said that no better. Madonna's song Material Girl could easily sum up the wealth and power of the West and all the flaws of that period in the West. We had Money, Power and more disposable income than we knew how to deal with it. President Reagan and Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher were true statespeople who truly believed in our way of life and that we were morally and ethically correct when it came to the Soviets and were the right people to lead the West in this Cold War. Personally, anyone disagreeing with that had their head stuck up somewhere during that time or truly were asleep and ignorant ( FYI, I was at Berkeley studying in the late 80's)

For many of us who were in our late teens and early twenties at that time, the fall of the Berlin wall is the greatest single event that defines our generation. The Cold War was won as of that point.

The scene where Mylene leads the escape from inside the gulag/prison onto the sea ice is like the fall of the Berlin wall and German Reunification. Freedom at last. The scene on the sea ice is Eastern Europe's coming to grips with what freedom is. That whole generation was lost for a time and disenchanted with what life in the West was. Many were lost and pined for the Days of the Communists telling them what to do. Ask anyone from that period to watch this video and they will point out something that personally moves them or has meaning.

What Mylene Farmer personally was expressing as to what the songs meaning is, is unknown to me and perhaps while she still is alive, someone should ask her for posterity. All I know is that I have taken one of the songs of cette incroyable Quebecoise to heart and that this song has special meaning to me. Merci beaucoup Mylene! Gros Bisous!

Song Meaning