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    French Folk Wisdom
    French Folk Wisdom
    French Folk Wisdom
    Ebook62 pages22 minutes

    French Folk Wisdom

    By Jay Burnett

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    About this ebook

    French Proverbs and Sayings - a people's condensed wisdom, in English and the original version

    A selection of over 300 French proverbs and sayings newly translated into English. The translations were kept as literal as possible, so as not to lose the authentic French flavour.

    A small sample:

    Aux vilains matous les belles chattes.
    The ugly tomcats get the prettiest cats.


    Le malheur vient à cheval et s'en retourne à pied.
    Misfortune arrives astride a horse, and leaves on foot.


    Il n'est jamais assez tard pour faire une sottise.
    It is never too late to commit a folly.


    Quand l'érudit se trompe, il se trompe avec érudition.
    When a scholar is wrong, he makes his mistake with erudition.


    Qui sait le plus doute le plus.
    Who knows most, doubts the most.


    Rien ne vieillit plus vite qu'un bienfait.
    Nothing gets old so fast as a favour.


    Quand Dieu envoie la farine, le diable enlève le sac.
    When God sends the flour, the devil carries the bag away.

    There are proverbs on Work, Money, Family, Health, Death, the Law, and Animals, to name just a few of the subjects covered. Enjoy as you add to your knowledge!

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherMind Games Publications
    Release dateApr 22, 2015
    ISBN9781513003412
    French Folk Wisdom

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      Book preview

      French Folk Wisdom - Jay Burnett

      French Folk Wisdom: Bilingual Edition

      ––––––––

      Jay Burnett

      Table of Contents

      Folk Wisdom from France

      Life in General

      Work and Business

      Money and Wealth

      Family and Relationships

      The Irony of Life

      Good Advice

      Health and Death

      Animals

      The Powerful, the Church and the Law

      About the author

      Folk Wisdom from France

      Our ancestors in pre-literate times were no more stupid than we are today. Just to survive required a great deal of astuteness. Wisdom often consisted in acute observation, and learning from one’s own as well as others’ hard-won and often painful experience.

      The various peoples of Europe condensed these lessons in short pithy proverbs and sayings, an important part of their popular culture to this day.

      To the foreign reader, they offer an interesting glimpse of a culture and its values, although some of the sayings do exist in identical or similar form across various languages (often because they derive from a common Latin root.)

      Short as they are, the proverbs encapsulate centuries of experience and well-defined attitudes. It is interesting to try and guess at the (non-literal) figurative meanings, as in a puzzle. Some are quite obscure, possibly because the cultural references no longer exist.

      These French proverbs differ from e.g. the German ones by more frequent reference to the Devil, and more clerical references (church, bell, procession, etc.) Overall they reflect a highly pragmatic and down-to-earth, even at times a cynical attitude towards life and society.

      Popular sayings and proverbs are notoriously difficult to translate. Some of the dramatic presentation and most of the wordplay inevitably gets lost. Nonetheless enough of the original sense survives to make proverbs an interesting read, ideal for those short intervals of your day when you don’t have enough time to get immersed in some longer, convoluted narrative.

      This EBook presents a selection of over 300 French popular phrases newly translated into English. I have aimed to keep the translations are as literal as possible, so as not to lose the authentic French flavour, but in some cases

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