# exemple d'un tour elliptique



## Icetrance

Hello,

Linguistically-speaking, I find this sentence interesting in French.

_Livres et Musique_, *ce sont* aussi des interviews exclusives d'artistes ou d'auteurs qui font partie du paysage culturel francais d'aujourd'hui. 

It wouldn't be interesting for native speakers, but it is for those of us who are not native Francophone speakers. 

We use ellipsises English as well.

Example:

It was raining when we left. I know it was. Ellipsis = (was raining)

However, ellipsises in French are sometimes used in situations where we would not use them in English. Such is the case above.

I would translate it by: _Books and Musique_ means/includes....

What do you think?


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## Jocaste

En français, on reprend constamment le sujet par un pronom à l'oral.
Exemples : 
_*Lui*, *il* est vraiment sympa ces temps-ci_.
_*Ce bouquin*, *il* m'a trop plu_.

On peut dire que c'est une tournure typiquement française. La reprise du sujet par un pronom est très courante.

_*Cette soirée* passée avec vous, *c'était* vraiment agréable !_
...

Je ne sais pas si ça aide vraiment  mais bon !


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## Maître Capello

Icetrance said:


> _Livres et Musique_, *ce sont* aussi des interviews exclusives d'artistes ou d'auteurs qui font partie du paysage culturel francais d'aujourd'hui.



You must be mistaken because there is no ellipsis in the above sentence…

An ellipsis in French is, I think, similar to English – at least in construction it's quite the same. E.g.: _Le ciel est nuageux, le temps sombre. _(which stands for _Le ciel est nuageux, le temps *est* sombre._)


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## Icetrance

Maître Capello said:


> You must be mistaken because there is no ellipsis in the above sentence…
> 
> An ellipsis in French is, I think, similar to English – at least in construction it's quite the same. E.g.: _Le ciel est nuageux, le temps sombre. _(which stands for _Le ciel est nuageux, le temps *est* sombre._)


 

You''re right. It's not a proper ellipsis, but something is "missing" here, which is taken to be understood. 

The _Livres et Musiques_ are NOT interviews, are they? These sections *mean/include* interviews,...

Something elliptical is going on, although it's not, as you said, full-on elliptical in nature.


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## Maître Capello

Icetrance said:


> The _Livres et Musiques_ are NOT interviews, are they? Correct. These sections *mean/** include* interviews,...
> 
> Something elliptical is going on, although it's not, as you said, full-on elliptical in nature.



I don't see anything elliptical – even remotely. In French, _X, c'est aussi Y_ sometimes means – as you pointed out – that Y is a part of X, as in:
_Un château fort, c'est aussi des murailles, des crénaux, des tours, un donjon, des douves, un pont-levis… _


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## Outsider

That's not an ellipsis, it's a topic-prominent construction. Yes, they are particularly characteristic of French, but other languages use them even more widely. Search the web for "topic-prominent language".


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## bofdico

In french, this kind of sentence is called "phrases emphatiques" and not "elliptiques".


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## Icetrance

Maître Capello said:


> I don't see anything elliptical – even remotely. In French, _X, c'est aussi Y_ sometimes means – as you pointed out – that Y is a part of X, as in:
> _Un château fort, c'est aussi des murailles, des crénaux, des tours, un donjon, des douves, un pont-levis… _


 
Although I do prefer "include" as a translation, "mean" implies _Livres et Musiques_ includes...

I'm using "elliptical" to mean "obscure/abstract", not as an omission of words. I'm sorry. I wasn't making myself clear.  I may have been confusing the two in my first post of this thread. I wasn't thinking too clearly when I was writing this post.

You can't take "être" for face value here. That's what I'm trying to say.


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## Icetrance

It's interesting how one could translate this construction into English. 

Here's a another example of this construction.

La Hollande est l'autre pays du fromage. Mais c'est aussi ses champs de tulipes, ses canaux, ses moulins = Holland is the other cheese country. But it's also a country of tulip fields, canals and windmills.

In English, it seems that we'd have to repeat "country" in the second sentence. I don't know anyway else around it.  

Vivre, c'est mourir un peu = Living means slightly dying

As for the original example, I'd translate it this way:

_Livres et Musique_, ce sont aussi des interviews exclusives d'artistes ou d'auteurs qui font partie du paysage culturel francais d'aujourd'hui > _Books_ and _Music_ also mean exclusive interviews with artists and writers, who are part of the cultural landscape of contemporary France. 

mean = to include/involve/contain

A very interesting French construction, to say the least...


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## Outsider

Icetrance said:


> La Hollande est l'autre pays du fromage. Mais c'est aussi ses champs de tulipes, ses canaux, ses moulins = Holland is the other cheese country. But it's also a country of tulip fields, canals and windmills.
> 
> In English, it seems that we'd have to repeat "country" in the second sentence. I don't know anyway else around it.


I think you can:

Holland is the other country of cheese. But *it*'s also its tulip fields, its canals, its windmills.  ​


Icetrance said:


> Vivre, c'est mourir un peu = Living means slightly dying
> 
> As for the original example, I'd translate it this way:
> 
> _Livres et Musique_, ce sont aussi des interviews exclusives d'artistes ou d'auteurs qui font partie du paysage culturel francais d'aujourd'hui > _Books_ and _Music_ also mean exclusive interviews with artists and writers, who are part of the cultural landscape of contemporary France.


You can translate the French construction literally, and it makes sense, although it probably doesn't work as well in English, stylistically:

Living, *it*'s dying a little.

_Livres et Musique_, *it*'s also exclusive interviews to artists or authors who are part of today's French cultural landscape.​


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## Icetrance

Outsider said:


> I think you can:
> 
> Holland is the other country of cheese. But *it*'s also its tulip fields, its canals, its windmills.​
> 
> No, that sounds funny. It just doesn't work.​You can translate the French construction literally, and it makes sense, although it probably doesn't work as well in English, stylistically:
> 
> Living, *it*'s dying a little.​No, that wouldn't work.
> 
> 
> _Livres et Musique_, *it*'s also exclusive interviews to artists or authors who are part of today's French cultural landscape.
> 
> 
> No, you can't say that. It doesn't make any sense in English


 

Again, it's elliptical in the way that the French allows for abstraction whereas the English usually does not. However, there are times we can be abstract with the verb "to be, but not as often as in French. 

Example: Living is to die slightly (we could easily say that).

But with the other examples, you can't translate it literally because it doesn't make any sense in English.


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## Outsider

I did say the latter two probably did not work, stylistically. It's not good-sounding English, but it gives the flavor of the French constructions. 

As others have told you, there is no ellipsis there. It's a different figure of speech.


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## Icetrance

Outsider said:


> I did say the latter two probably did not work, stylistically. It's not good-sounding English, but it gives the flavor of the French constructions.
> 
> As others have told you, there is no ellipsis there. It's a different figure of speech.


 
_Elliptical _has more than one meaning. I'm using now to mean a more abstract way of saying something.


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