La Galette des Rois

January 6, 2016 simonrkemp Leave a comment

photo [8485]

Whilst France is proud of its republicanism with ‘liberté, égalité, fraternité’ as its motto, and of its secularism or ‘laïcité’, many of its traditions go back to the ‘Ancien Régime’, the pre-revolutionary catholic monarchy. One of these is derived at once from marking Epiphany or Twelfth night (‘l’Epiphanie’ or ‘le jour des Rois’) when the three wise men (‘les rois mages’ or magus kings as they are known in French) are said to have bestowed gifts on Jesus, and from carnivalesque celebrations in which social hierarchies could briefly be reversed, in the spirit of the Roman Saturnalia. The ‘galette des Rois’ is the sweet pie served on the ‘jour des Rois’. Like Victorian Christmas puddings, it contains a charm. Originally ‘galettes des Rois’ were baked with a raw broad bean or ‘fève’. Whoever found it in their portion became king or queen for the day. Modern boulangeries and pâtisseries offer a bewildering variety of ‘galettes des Rois’ with little china or earthenware charms called ‘fèves’ after the more prosaic pulse used in bygone years. The first of these porcelain charms are thought to have been in the shape of babies meant to represent Jesus. When the Revolution briefly renamed the ‘galette des Rois’ ‘galette de l’Egalité’, the republican ‘bonnet phrygien’ or Phrygian cap was the inspiration for the shape of the ‘fève’.

photo (28) [8487]

The most usual recipes for ‘galette des Rois’ are of ‘pâte feuilletée’ (puff pastry) filled with ‘frangipane’ (frangipani or almond stuffing), except in the South of France where the ‘gâteau des Rois’ is a brioche flavoured with orange blossom (‘fleur d’oranger’).

When the pudding is served, chance plays its part in the selection process which is called ‘tirer les rois’: the youngest member of the party, ‘le benjamin’, squats under the table and calls out the name of the person to whom each piece of the ‘galette’ is to be given. You become king or queen, can choose a consort and are allowed to keep the ‘fève’ if it is your piece of pie. Collectors of ‘fèves’ are known as ‘fabophiles’. Nowadays, pâtisseries and boulangeries supply paper crowns when you purchase a ‘galette’ and the ‘fèves’ come in many shapes, from cartoon characters like Astérix or Tintin to famous people like Marie-Antoinette or Napoleon, from Provençal ‘santons’ to cars, planes or all manner of other things including rings—which may allude to one legend: that the inspiration for the first ‘fève’ was the heroine of Perrault’s fairytale, ‘Peau d’âne’, losing her ring in the cake she baked.

In the latter half of the eighteenth century, before the Revolution, when republican ideals were being actively discussed by some intellectuals, the ‘philosophe’ Denis Diderot (1713-1784) wrote occasional verse when he became ‘roi de la fève’ two years running. Here is the beginning of the ‘Complainte’ in which he refers to ‘les embarras de la royauté’, the particular troubles one has to face when one is monarch.

Quand on est roi, l’on a plus d’une affaire,

Voisins jaloux, arsenaux à munir,

Peuple hargneux, complots à prévenir,

Travaux en paix, dangers en guerre,

Ma foi, je crois qu’on ne s’amuse guère

Quand on est roi.

The stanza uses different types of lines (‘vers hétérométriques’). In French verse, stresses are not counted but syllables are and, on the whole, give their name to the lines (the exception being the twelve-syllable line more often called ‘alexandrin’ or alexandrine than ‘dodécasyllabe’, and of which there are two in the last quotation infra). Here you have examples of ‘décasyllabes’, ‘octosyllabes’ and a final ‘tétrasyllabe’ (which acts as a refrain in the rest of the poem). Diderot was a famous thinker and writer, but did not go down in history as a great poet. This is a piece written for fun rather than for posterity. A little further along Diderot says that when he fell asleep during his term as king, in his dreams he carried out heroic exploits and made new laws of a particular kind:

Vraiment, je fis des lois, je les fis même en vers.

En vers mauvais ; qui vous dit le contraire ?

But then writing bad verse, he adds, is not a cardinal sin, even if you are a king!

Avoir une affaire: nowadays ‘affaires’ refer to business. A businessman or woman is ‘un homme ou une femme d’affaires’, if you work in business you are ‘dans les affaires’. If you say ‘j’ai une affaire en ville’ it means I have some business to sort out in town. In the poem ‘avoir plus d’une affaire’ means to have a lot on your plate which you need to sort out.

Arsenaux à munir: ‘arsenaux’ is the regular plural of ‘arsenal’, which was originally where warships were built and armed. It is also, as in English, a weapons depot—and that, incidentally helps explain why Arsenal footballers are known as ‘the gunners’. ‘Munir’ here has the same root as ‘munitions’ (the noun exists both in English and in French). It basically means to stock up or equip. It can be used simply to say that you have what you need for a particular purpose: ‘pour faire mes courses, je suis muni(e) d’un gros sac’ means you are well prepared with a big bag to go shopping.

Hargneux is an adjective formed on the noun ‘hargne’, spite, so it means spiteful or aggressive.

Un Complot : a plot

Prévenir : Here it means to prevent, as in the popular saying ‘mieux vaut prévenir que guérir’. Often it is a synonym of ‘avertir’, to warn.

galette

Here is a 1774 painting called Le Gâteau des Rois, housed in the Musée Fabre in Montpellier. It is by one of Diderot’s favourite artists, Jean-Baptiste Greuze (1725-1805). It is a ‘scène de genre’ or ‘genre painting’ showing ordinary people in a domestic setting and is a far cry from some of the grandiose mythological pictures which other contemporary painters produced. Greuze made a point of representing family members in their homes, usually wearing their everyday clothes. Here, our attention is drawn to the expressions on the characters’ faces: something special is obviously happening. One piece of the ‘galette des Rois’, in the middle of the picture and of the table, has been set aside. It is probably the ‘part du pauvre’ (literally, the pauper’s share), traditionally kept for anyone who might walk in. The youngest child is not hidden under the table as he would be nowadays. He is pulling the pieces of cake out of a white napkin held by the paterfamilias as the names of the people present are called. Greuze shows how a simple event can turn into a ritual and a moment of domestic harmony. It suggests that you do not need wealth and luxury to enjoy moments of peace and happiness.

galette2

French life

End-of-year round-up

December 16, 2015 simonrkemp 1 Comment

posted by Simon Kemp

Adventures on the Bookshelf is about to head off for its Christmas break. There’s just time for a quick look back at 2015 before we go.

For France, 2015 opened with a tragedy and has closed with another one. In January, we looked at responses in the French press to the shootings at Charlie Hebdo.

Last month, we found ourselves witnessing another massacre, this time on a much larger scale, with the attacks on the Bataclan concert hall, the Stade de France, and diners and drinkers of Paris’s cafe culture. Again, we looked at some of the responses to the events in the French media.

In between, though, there was much to explore in French language, literature and life. We learned how to make grammatically correct chocolate cake with the aid of glamorous French movie stars, discovered why Terry Pratchett causes trouble for French gender rules, and uncovered the complex secrets of the mysterious Mrs Vandertramp.

Expanding our vocabulary, we encountered the gripping etymological drama of the unicorn and the crayfish, found out what the cool kids on the street are saying these days, and learned the hidden connection between limousines and bayonets. Plus, there was the opportunity to laugh at hapless French sign-writers struggling with their own language, or try your skills in our fiendish faux-amis quiz.

Guest appearances were made by two more heroes who gave their lives to the service of the French nation and their surnames to the service of the French dictionary: Joseph-Ignace Guillotin and Etienne de Silhouette.

We also discovered what the students at Oxford have been up to lately, from turning parchments into webpages to falling in love with the Montmartre district of Paris.

As ever, there were suggestions of books and films you might like to if you want to explore French culture in a little more depth.

And, snuck in among the other posts, were a few reasons why you might like to think seriously about doing a degree in modern languages, and a little advice on how you might go about it if you wanted to apply to study the subject with us.

Merry Christmas to you from the Oxford Modern Languages Faculty. Thank you for reading, and we’ll see you on the first Wednesday in the New Year.

French life

From Saint Nicolas to Petit Papa Noël

December 9, 2015 simonrkemp Leave a comment

posted by Catriona Seth

In places like Lorraine, the former sovereign duchy which became a part of France in 1766 and is now a ‘département’, or in Fribourg, in Switzerland, one of the earliest signs of the festive season is the presence, in the local ‘boulangeries’, of figures made of ‘pain d’épices’ (gingerbread)—which the Swiss sometimes call ‘biscômes’—in the shape of a bishop, complete with a crook or crozier (‘une crosse’) and a mitre (‘une mitre’—the word for the episcopal headgear is the same). He is Saint Nicolas (there is no ‘h’ in the name in French), a 3^rd century Turk who is the patron of Fribourg and of Lorraine, but also, amongst others, of sailors, physiotherapists and children. His feast day on December 6^th is celebrated with public processions in which he walks the streets, with his donkey, sometimes accompanied by a darkly clad individual, the ‘Père fouettard’, literally the whipping father, who is supposed to chastise badly behaved boys and girls. Saint Nicolas, on the other hand, carries a long basked strapped to his shoulders like a backpack—it is called ‘une hotte’ and is similar to the one used by grape-pickers. In it he has presents and sweets for those who have not been naughty.

Because he was considered to be a major figure of the early Church, Saint Nicolas’ relics were revered in different places of worship like Bari in Italy, Fribourg—where his right arm is preserved in a jewelled reliquary—and Saint-Nicolas-de-Port, South of Nancy, in Lorraine, where one of his finger bones—a ‘phalange’ or phalanx—is still kept in the treasure-house of an important gothic basilica. The modern pageants grew out of religious ceremonies.

The name ‘Santa Claus’ is a deformation of Saint Nicolas or its Dutch version, Sint Nicolaas, and in many French-speaking regions the bishop has been overtaken by the jolly figure of Father Christmas as the purveyor of gifts to be opened no longer on December 6^th, but on the 24^th or 25^th. ‘Le Père Noël’ is called upon to leave presents not in stockings, but in shoes left out at the foot of the tree—‘le sapin de Noël’. Whilst the tradition of singing carols is much less prevalent in French than in English, many French-speakers know the words to the musical equivalent of a letter to Santa, Petit Papa Noël—said to be, in Tino Rossi’s original version, the best-selling French single of all time. The singer (in fact a father giving voice to his sleeping son) asks Father Christmas not to forget his ‘petit soulier’ when he comes down from the skies to deliver thousands of toys—‘des jouets par milliers’. The request comes, even though he admits ‘je n’ai pas été tous les jours très sage’, but then again, hands up anyone who can claim only ever to have been good!

For a time-warp experience, you can find the original Tino Rossi recording of ‘Petit Papa Noël’ taken from the 1946 black and white film Destins here:

And Vincy’s lyrics here.

This is the chorus (‘le refrain’) of Petit Papa Noël:
Petit papa Noël
Quand tu descendras du ciel,
Avec des jouets par milliers,
N’oublie pas mon petit soulier.

And here is some vocabulary for the rest of the song:

La paupière : the eyelid.
Quelque chose me tarde: I am impatient for something to happen. The verb ‘tarder’ has the same root as ‘tard’ and ‘un retard’, meaning late and a delay.

Un joujou: a toy. Remember, ‘joujou’, which is a familiar term derived from ‘jouet’ is one of the words ending in ‘ou’ which has an irregular plural (not an ‘s’, but an ‘x’): des joujoux.

The following words all have irregular plurals with ‘x’: bijou, caillou, chou, genou, hibou, joujou & pou. Some French-speaking children learn the following mnemonic: ‘Viens mon chou, mon bijou, sur mes genoux, laisse tes joujoux et jette des cailloux à ce vieil hibou plein de poux.’

In the mnemonic, ‘chou’ is not used to mean ‘cabbage’ but as the equivalent of ‘dear’. ‘Un pou’ is a louse and ‘un hibou’, an owl.

‘Le marchand de sable’, literally ‘the sand merchant’, is the sandman who is said to sprinkle sand in children’s eyes to make them sleep and dream sweet dreams.

‘faire dodo’ is a familiar expression meaning to sleep. You sometimes encounter ‘dodo’ as a noun: ‘J’ai fait un bon dodo après le déjeuner’ is a way of saying I had a good sleep after lunch.

Events and Competitions, Film

French Film Competition 2016!

December 2, 2015 simonrkemp 4 Comments

posted by Kate Rees

As in recent years, the Oxford University Faculty of Medieval and Modern Languages is organising a French Film Competition, run with the help and generosity of Routes into Languages (South).

The competition has been a successful and entertaining way of getting young people interested in France and French culture, and has attracted hundreds of entries over the last few years. The challenge is to re-write the ending of a film in no more than 1500 words. It is open to all students of secondary-school age, from years 7-13. We’re also very keen to encourage filmed entries via Youtube submissions, so please feel free to re-imagine the endings of the chosen films in as creative a way as you can.

This year we have chosen two films directed by Céline Sciamma, an up and coming French director. Pupils in years 7-11 are invited to re-write the ending of Tomboy (2011), which sees a young girl moving to a new Parisian neighbourhood and exploring her own identity.

Those in years 12-13 are encouraged to look at Sciamma’s most recent film, Bande de filles (2014), which depicts the life of a group of young black girls coming of age in the suburbs of Paris. Raising issues of gender, race and class, this is also a film about friendship and conflict.

We very much enjoy judging the competition and are always impressed by the imagination and wit of the submissions. Entries should be submitted by email to french.essay@mod-langs.ox.ac.uk by noon on 31^st March 2016.

A first prize of £100 will be awarded to the winning student in each category, with runner-up prizes of £25. For further details about entering the competition (including the points in each film where we’d like you to take up the story), please see the questions below, and go to http://www.mod-langs.ox.ac.uk/film_comp to find the link to the cover sheet for your entry.

We’re looking forward to reading your work!

What counts as ‘the ending’ of the film?

We’d like you to start your re-writing from the following points:
Tomboy: from 1:06:03, when Laure’s mother says “Lève-toi tu dois t’habiller”

Bande de filles: from 1:16:59, when Marieme/Vic says ‘J’ai un plan’ to her friends.

Does ‘re-writing’ mean I have to change everything?

There is nothing stopping you from watching the ‘real’ ending and then modifying it as you see fit. Indeed, you might find this helpful. Please note, though, that we’re looking for creative, entertaining and inventive new endings, which address as fully and plausibly as possible the strands of the story that are left unresolved at the end-points we’ve specified above.

What form should the essay take?

There is no particular expectation as to how you submit your entry – you might like, for example, to submit it in screenplay format (with descriptions of camera angle, voice-over, lighting etc.), or as a play (with speech-prefixes and dialogue) or in prose, as in a novel. You might even like to submit your ‘new’ ending via YouTube or other social media..! If so, email us the link with your attached coversheet. The form should be the one you feel shows your creativity in the best light.

Where can I or my school/college get hold of the films?

The DVDs are readily and affordably available via Amazon (http://www.amazon.co.uk or http://www.amazon.fr).

Is there a limit to the amount of entries any one school can make?

Yes. There is a limit of 15 entries per school per age group.

Should I enter as an individual or can I enter as part of a group?

We would ask you to keep to individually-named submissions, please: this is just to ensure as much as possible parity and fairness between entries, and to avoid any distinction between smaller and larger groups.

French life

Two Responses

November 25, 2015 simonrkemp Leave a comment

posted by Simon Kemp

This week, two responses to the Paris attacks that you may not have seen.

Firstly, an interview with a teacher at a school around the corner from the Bataclan, which is also not far from the Charlie Hebdo offices where this year’s earlier attack took place. Marie Piquemal, a journalist with Liberation went to talk to her over the weekend after the attacks to talk about how she would face her pupils on Monday morning. The full article is here.

«Je veux les aider. Etre avec eux, le plus disponible possible.» Cette maîtresse de CM2 enseigne à Paris, dans une école voisine du Bataclan. Elle ne tient pas à ce que son nom apparaisse de peur que ses élèves (ou leurs parents) lisent et que cela les perturbe «encore plus». Elle fera classe ce lundi matin, comme dans toutes les écoles. Le ministre de l’Intérieur a annoncé samedi soir que tous les établissements scolaires et universitaires rouvriraient lundi, après avoir été fermés samedi.

disponible: literally, ‘available’, but here in the sense of ‘I want to be there for them’

CM2: top year of primary school, for 10-11-year-olds

Elle ne tient pas à ce que son nom apparaisse: she does not want her name to appear (in the newspaper)

Le ministre de l’Intérieur: equivalent post in Government to British Home Secretary

Tout le week-end, elle a essayé de se préparer au maximum. Elle a imprimé des images qui lui serviront de support pour les échanges en classe: un drapeau en berne, la devise de Paris, ce dessin de Joann Sfar avec cette bulle: «Les gens qui sont morts ce soir étaient dehors pour vivre, boire, chanter. Ils ne savaient pas qu’on leur avait déclaré la guerre.» Elle a aussi pris un stock de bougies, la chanson Imagine de John Lennon. «Je verrai avec mes collègues ce qu’on utilise ou pas. Mais j’ai préféré prévoir, pour ne pas me sentir démunie.» Elle ajoute: « On a beau essayer d’anticiper, il va falloir gérer sur le moment. J’espère surtout ne pas avoir de grosse mauvaise nouvelle. On a tenté de joindre toutes les familles, mais il n’a pas été possible de savoir pour tout le monde.»

les échanges en classe: class discussions

en berne: at half-mast

la devise: motto. The motto of Paris is ‘Fluctuat nec mergitur’, which translates as ‘It is tossed in the waves, but it does not sink’. It accompanies the city’s coat of arms, which has the image of a ship:

démunie: at a loss, without resources

gérer sur le moment: play it by ear

Elle raconte aussi que beaucoup de parents, angoissés, ont appelé le directeur pour savoir si la sécurité serait renforcée. La demande a été transmise au rectorat. Une cellule psychologique sera par ailleurs opérationnelle dès lundi matin pour aider les enfants et les parents. Ce sera aussi le cas à l’école du 155 avenue Parmentier, dans le quartier voisin où se trouvent Le Carillon et Le Petit Cambodge, également attaqués vendredi. Et dans tous les établissements «où les élèves, leurs familles et les personnels de l’Éducation ont été particulièrement affectés», précise un communiqué du ministère. Mais aussi dans ceux où l’équipe pédagogique en formulera la demande.

angoissé: anxious

le rectorat: local education authority

la cellule psychologique: psychological support unit

l’équipe pédagogique: the teaching staff

«Les psychologues seront là, c’est précieux», dit encore l’enseignante. Son école est près du Bataclan mais aussi des anciens locaux de Charlie Hebdo. «On a vécu les attentats de janvier. C’était au moment de la sortie des classes, un mercredi midi. Les enfants ont été confinés à l’intérieur, ils s’en souviennent.» Jeudi dernier, l’école a fait l’exercice d’entraînement annuel du «plan de mise en sûreté des écoles face aux risques majeurs» (PPMS). «Les élèves ont posé plein de questions: “Est-ce que ca peut se reproduire?”. Je les ai rassurés du mieux que j’ai pu. Je leur ai dit qu’ils ne risquaient rien. Mais là, cela va être plus difficile. Qu’est ce que je vais leur dire?»

l’enseignante: teacher

les anciens locaux: the former premises

le plan de mise en sûreté des écoles face aux risques majeurs: the security action plan for schools in case of major risk

du mieux que j’ai pu: as best I could

Secondly, a short video. It’s called Cent Maux, which means ‘A Hundred Bad Things’, ‘ A Hundred Evils’ or ‘A Hundred Hurts’. It’s also homophonic for ‘Cent Mots’, ‘a hundred words’, and the video consists of a hundred words (in French and English) responding to the attacks. If that doesn’t sound very engaging to you, then I suggest you give it two minutes of your time and be proved wrong.

[The video seems to be resisting my attempts to embed it in the blog, so you’ll have to go and visit it on its Facebook page here. It’s worth the trip.]

French life

Paris

November 18, 2015 simonrkemp 1 Comment

posted by Simon Kemp

Usually this blog tries to give you things that will help you better understand what’s going on in France, and language tips that will help improve your French.

This week, though, I can’t help you understand what happened in Paris last Friday night, as I don’t understand it myself. And the only French word I have for you is one that, if it hasn’t been part of your vocabulary up to now, you won’t be able to use in normal conversation for a while:

BATACLAN, noun, masculine
Familiar. Attirail encombrant composé d’objets dont on veut se dispenser de donner le nom.

Cumbersome materials made up of things one does not want to take the trouble to name. ‘Gear’, ‘clobber’.

USE IN QUOTATIONS:

1. ‘Ta bonne maman ne pourra pas être à Dieppe dimanche. Il lui faudra, au moins, un jour ou deux pour resserrer tout son bataclan.’
FLAUBERT, Correspondance, 1866, p. 221.

Use in phrases: (Et) tout le bataclan. Et cætera, et tout le reste. Etc., and all the rest

2. Ah! si l’on n’avait pas la religion, la prière dans les églises, (…), si l’on n’avait pas la Sainte-Vierge et saint Antoine de Padoue, et tout le bataclan, on serait bien plus malheureux, ça c’est sûr…
MIRBEAU, Le Journal d’une femme de chambre, 1900, p. 21.

Etymology: Origin obscure. Possibly onomatopoeic.

Normal blogging again from next week.

French language

Sometimes French is hard for French people too

November 11, 2015 simonrkemp Leave a comment

posted by Simon Kemp

Poor French people! With so many silent letters and homophones (words that sound the same but are spelled differently) to contend with, it’s no wonder that written French can sometimes be a tricky area even for fluent speakers of the language. Here are some examples of native speakers coming unstuck with some embarrassingly high-profile written French. See if you can spot the errors, and if you can see the difference between the kinds of mistakes native speakers make from the ones language learners make:

All the images are from here, a website I hesitate to link to as so many of the other grammar and spelling mistakes they feature turn out really quite rude. Still, you can’t get the rude jokes unless you can understand the French, so I suppose it’s all educationally sound.

As for native-speaker mistakes, you may notice that all the sentences above make perfect sense if you read them out loud. The wrong words are all homophones for the correct ones, e.g. ‘encre’ (ink) for ‘ancre’ (anchor), ‘retirer’ for ‘retirées’. Like native English speakers muddling ‘there’, ‘their’ and ‘they’re’, French speakers know how it’s meant to sound, but not necessarily how it’s meant to look, which leads them to make quite different slips from the ones foreigners learning French tend to commit.

Applying to study modern languages

But what’s it really like? English and Modern Languages

November 4, 2015 simonrkemp Leave a comment

English and Modern Languages is the most popular of our ‘joint schools’ courses that combine a modern language with another subject, and the one for which places are most hotly contested. You can do English with French, or with any one of eight other languages: Spanish, Russian, German, Celtic, Czech, Greek, Italian or Portuguese. The last four of those you can also start from scratch on the course. Full details of what the course involves and how you can apply for it are here, and below is a short film by those who study and teach on the course to tell you all about it:

Film

Bookshelf Film Club Halloween Special: Les Diaboliques

October 28, 2015 simonrkemp Leave a comment

posted by Simon Kemp

This time last year we suggested a chilling little ghost story, Guy de Maupassant’s Le Horla, to curl up with for Halloween. This year, it’s the turn of the film club.

Les Diaboliques is a classic French chiller from 1955, based on a tale by the same French crime-writing duo who wrote Hitchcock’s Vertigo, another unsettling splice of the murder mystery and the ghost story. Apparently, Hitchcock missed out on getting the film rights to the story by a matter of hours, as the French director Henri-Georges Clouzot snapped them up as soon as they became available.

In the film, the frail Christina is the owner of a shabby French boarding school. Her brute of a husband is the headmaster, who is openly having an affair with another teacher at the school, Nicole. The two women are not enemies, however. Michel treats them both so badly that they end up forming a bond together, and that friendship leads to a plan to improve both their lives by getting rid of Michel for good…

Lured away far from the school, Michel is sedated by the two women and then drowned in a bath-tub. They then drive the body back to the school and dump it in the murky, leaf-covered swimming pool, with the intention of claiming an accident when the body finally bobs to the surface.

Then they wait.

No body surfaces.

The pool is drained.

No body is found.

It’s then that things get seriously strange.

One of the schoolboys says he’s seen Michel on the school grounds.

A school photo is taken, and a pale shape can be seen in the window behind the assembled children, a shape that looks like a face. Like Michel’s face.

Nicole and Christina start to think that the persistent questions of the police may be the least of their problems…

Les Diaboliques is a creepy classic that always features in lists of the best scary movies ever made. It’s ideal for a dark and lonely night around Halloween. Just make sure you avoid the American remake with Sharon Stone which is, ahem, diabolical.

One other thing — the film has one of the best and most famous final sequences in French movie history. Make sure you don’t accidentally find out what’s coming before you see it. And once you’ve seen it, please obey the command at the end of the film, and don’t spoil the ending for others:

French language

Quiz time!

October 21, 2015 simonrkemp 1 Comment

Right, it’s time for another Adventures on the Bookshelf quiz! This one is all about faux amis.

Below are two dictionary definitions. The red one is from a French dictionary, the blue one is from an English dictionary. Your job is guess the words being defined. The twist is that the French and English words are both spelled the same way, even though they mean completely different things.

Take a look. (There’s no need to understand every word in the French definition to play the game.)

_ _ _ _ (4 letters)

Petit animal domestique carnassier, à pelage de couleur variée souvent noir ou gris, se nourrissant de souris, de petites proies, et de la nourriture servie par ses maîtres.

Talk in a friendly, informal way.

So, if you could work out a little of the gist of the French definition (the whole thing translates as: ‘Small carnivorous domestic animal, with variable fur colour, often black or grey, which eats mice, small prey creatures or food given by its owners’), you might have got that it’s a cat, or ‘un chat’ in French, which is a faux ami for the English verb, ‘chat’, meaning… to talk in a friendly, informal way!

OK, got it?

Ten questions below. No peeking at the answers until you’ve had a go at all of them. Time starts now!

_ _ _ _ _

Numéral cardinal. Quinze plus un.

Take hold of suddenly and forcibly.

2. _ _ _ _

Qui se lave insuffisamment ou mal; qui manque de propreté.

A period during which a shop sells goods at reduced prices.

3. _ _ _ _ _

Susceptible de conséquences étendues, de suites fâcheuses, dangereuses.

A hole dug in the ground to receive a coffin or corpse, typically marked by a stone or mound.

4. _ _ _ _ _

Composante prédominante du corps humain ou animal, essentiellement constituée des tissus musculaire et conjonctif.

A separate seat for one person, typically with a back and four legs.

5. _ _ _

Endroit dans lequel un footballeur doit envoyer le ballon pour marquer.

Conjunction used to introduce a clause contrasting with what has already been mentioned.

6. _ _ _ _

Préposition. En échange de, en remplacement de, à la place de.

Flow rapidly in a steady stream.

7. _ _ _ _

Partie d’une cuisinière qui sert à la cuisson des aliments.

Even number, less than ten.

8. _ _ _ _

Aliment fait d’une certaine quantité de farine mêlée d’eau et de levain et cuit au four

Highly unpleasant physical sensation caused by illness or injury.

9. _ _

Arbre à feuilles persistantes longues, étroites, vénéneuses, d’un vert très sombre, à baies rouges, qui est utilisé comme arbre d’ornement dans les parcs, les jardins, les cimetières.

Conjunction introducing a conditional clause.

10. _ _ _ _

Organe terminal du bras, formé d’une partie élargie articulée sur l’avant-bras et terminé par cinq doigts.

Chief in size or importance.

Answers below the French cat!

Answers:

1. seize (seize = 16)

2. sale (sale = dirty)

3. grave (grave = serious)

4. chair (la chair = flesh)

5. but (le but = goal)

6. pour (pour = for)

7. four (le four = oven)

8. pain (le pain = bread)

9. if (un if = yew tree)

10 main (la main = hand)

How did you do?

7-10 correct: Carrément terrible!

3-6 correct: Pas terrible.

0-3 correct: Frankly terrible.

Like this? Try our fiendish odd-one-out quiz as well!

A blog for students and teachers of Years 11 to 13, and anyone else with an interest in Modern Foreign Languages and Cultures, written by the staff and students of Oxford University. Updated every Wednesday!