Spinchäeb Ape Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 4468 days ago 146 posts - 180 votes Speaks: English*, German
| Message 1 of 7 10 November 2012 at 5:58am | IP Logged |
Way back in the 80s when I was learning German, my first German text included a sentence that made me laugh:
Quote:
Sie ist wirklich gar nicht hübsch, tanzt sehr schlecht, und ist einfach langweilig." |
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It means:
Quote:
She is really not at all pretty, dances very badly, and is simply boring. |
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I memorized the sentence because it helped me to learn the vocabulary in it. I want to do the same with French and was attempting to translate it into that language. Here's what I've come up with:
Quote:
Elle n'est pas vraiment jolie, danse très mal, et elle est tout simplement ennuyeux. |
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Is my translation correct?
Edited by Spinchäeb Ape on 10 November 2012 at 6:01am
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agantik Triglot Senior Member France Joined 4633 days ago 217 posts - 335 votes Speaks: French*, English, Italian Studies: German, Norwegian
| Message 2 of 7 10 November 2012 at 8:03am | IP Logged |
You should say "elle est tout simplement ennuyeuse" (the adjective is feminine here) otherwise your
translation is correct :)
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Spinchäeb Ape Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 4468 days ago 146 posts - 180 votes Speaks: English*, German
| Message 3 of 7 10 November 2012 at 6:34pm | IP Logged |
Okay, thanks for the help.
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yong321 Groupie United States yong321.freeshe Joined 5540 days ago 80 posts - 104 votes Studies: Spanish
| Message 4 of 7 10 November 2012 at 10:37pm | IP Logged |
"elle est tout simplement ennuyeux" is what Google Translator gives when you put in "she is simply boring". If you take out "simply", "ennuyeux" becomes "ennuyeuse". Bing Translator (http://www.bing.com/translator) doesn't have this problem.
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Spinchäeb Ape Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 4468 days ago 146 posts - 180 votes Speaks: English*, German
| Message 5 of 7 11 November 2012 at 2:30am | IP Logged |
But which is the right way to say it and still convey the meaning of einfach langweilig/simply boring? Doesn't "simplement" have to be in there?
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201128114 Triglot Newbie Canada https://learniceland Joined 4755 days ago 6 posts - 14 votes Speaks: French*, English, Icelandic Studies: German, Spanish
| Message 6 of 7 11 November 2012 at 4:28am | IP Logged |
At the risk of being too picky, I would suggest translating "she is really not at all pretty" into "elle n'est (vraiment)
pas jolie du tout", rather than "elle n'est pas vraiment jolie" which sounds much less categorical.
And yes, "tout simplement ennuyeuse" is a accurate translation of "simply boring"
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yong321 Groupie United States yong321.freeshe Joined 5540 days ago 80 posts - 104 votes Studies: Spanish
| Message 7 of 7 11 November 2012 at 4:38am | IP Logged |
Spinchäeb Ape wrote:
But which is the right way to say it and still convey the meaning of einfach langweilig/simply boring? Doesn't "simplement" have to be in there? |
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Of course what "agantik" says in message 2 is correct.
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