CARLES li reis, nostre emperere magnes, Set anz tuz pleins ad estet en Espaigne : Tresqu’en la mer cunquist la tere altaigne. N’i ad castel ki devant lui remaigne ; Mur ne citet n’i est remés a fraindre, Fors Sarraguce, ki est en une muntaigne. Li reis Marsilie la tient, ki Deu nen aimet. Mahumet […]
Qu’est-ce qui a provoqué l’incendie?
Often it’s our native language that leads us down the wrong path. Take, for example, the word what. What plays many roles in English. It is a word that stands for missing information in direct questions: What did you say? You said what? What is your problem? What caused the fire? What happened? What happened […]
Mastering the subjunctive
The French subjunctive can be a challenge for a few reasons. English speakers don’t use the subjunctive in the same way, so don’t have a reference point. The subjunctive involves what appears to be a fairly complex set of rules and a new set of conjugations. And if you weren’t taught it at school it […]
Je vais m’y mettre
There are things you’re supposed to have learnt at beginners’ level that can still cause trouble later on. Take for example these two sentences: J’y suis allé mercredi dernier. I went there last week. Je vais y aller mercredi prochain. I will go there next week. The y meaning “there” switches places: it’s before suis […]
C’est moi qui…
Take a look at these four sentences: (i) It’s me who is in charge. (ii) It’s I who am in charge. (iii) It’s me who am in charge. (iv) It’s I who is in charge. If you’re a native English speaker, you’ll recognize instinctively that (i) and (ii) sound right, whereas (iii) and (iv) sound […]
Jamais de ma vie je n’ai eu aussi peur
Take a look at these French sentences and see whether you know what the missing words are. You can click here to see the answers. Hide the answers 1) Je ne me ferai plus prendre à l’avenir. I won’t get caught out again in the future. 2) J’ai confiance dans l’avenir. I have faith in […]
The problem with « avec »
Avec is one of the first words you come across in French.
It means “with”.
It’s easy to pronounce.
Nothing could be simpler. Except…
Conquering Proust
Launching into À la recherche du temps perdu is a unique experience. It’s not so much the length (though at 1.5 million words and 2400 pages it is the longest novel ever published), but the baggage that comes with it. I still remember how small I felt when a fellow student at University told me […]
Les perles d’un collier
The rhythm of spoken French resembles a string of pearls or the beads of a rosary, wrote the phonetician Pierre Delattre: L’égalité syllabique a fait comparer le rythme du français aux perles d’un collier, au grain d’un chapelet, aux battements du coeur. Bien qu’il soit un peu saccadé, ce rythme n’est ni dur (les syllabes […]