# jardin secret



## williamtmiller

Hello,

I was giving an English lesson today and one of my students asked how to say "jardin secret" in English. I had a blank--any ideas. The context is the things that teenagers prefer to keep for themselves, in private.
thanks


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## Marie-Christine

what about private thoughts? I know not nearly as poetic as the French!!!! but so far that's the best I can come up with...just starting the day, brain needs to get in gear!!!!!


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## badgrammar

Secret garden works fine in English, there are books, films, etc. that go by that tiitle.  Google it and you will see


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## Agnès E.

Does *private secrets* work as well? I'd tend to use it.


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## badgrammar

Hmmm,  I don't really think so.  A "jardin secret" does not just mean an entirely mental (in one's head) phenomenon.  A secret garden can also be a physical place one visits unbeknownst to one's family and friends.  Or an alternative set of friends one has, whose existence is unknown to one's primary realtions.  It could be a website, or could even be a euphemism for an extra-marital relationship.

"I often go to the XYZ, but nobody in my family knows.  It's kind of my secret garden"
"Acting classes became my secret garden, I was able to express things there that my friends and family would never understand.
"Our friendship was a secret garden where we shared ideas and dreams we could not share with anyone else"
"When I was with X, it was as if we were hiding in our secret garden, where no one else had any importance."
"Online chatting with Y opened up a secret garden to me."
"When he read me his poetry, he was inviting me inside his secret garden"

Basically, it is not a term used just for one's private thoughts.  It is exactly what the saying suggests:  A place (mental or physical) that one cultivates or uses without the knowledge of one's entourage.

Quite seriously, I've thought about this phrase a lot over the years, it's actually quite a powerful term for me, it can have many dimensions.  That is why I say:  Don't go looking for noon at 2 o'clock, the darn thing is a "secret garden".  The term speaks for itself! D:


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## williamtmiller

Interesting, never heard the word secret garden before in English but I am glad to know it exists. I agree, secret thoughts does not do justice to the term jardin secret which in the case of my student was actually her daughter's Blog.


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## badgrammar

If you do a google search on it, you will see that it is a widely used term.  I found 6 510 000 responses for "secret garden" in quotation marks, so I think that's a good endorsement for use of the term...


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## James Brandon

"Un jardin secret" is a nice expression in French. It refers to someone's secret or semi-secret passion/hobby; if not a secret passion, it could just be something that the person rarely talks about and does not publicise. E.g.: A famous lawyer spends all his weekends reading Ancient Greek poetry, and no one knows except his wife and closest friends. He would say: "C'est mon jardin secret." 

I can think of a few expressions in English but they are not too good... Any suggestions? 

Thanks


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## whoisal

Peut-etre:

It's my little hideaway.


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## James Brandon

It may not be a physical location in the French meaning - it is used figuratively in fact rather than to refer to one's geographical environment etc.


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## Gutenberg

James Brandon said:


> "Un jardin secret" is a nice expression in French. It refers to someone's secret or semi-secret passion/hobby; if not a secret passion, it could just be something that the person rarely talks about and does not publicise. E.g.: A famous lawyer spends all his weekends reading Ancient Greek poetry, and no one knows except his wife and closest friends. He would say: "C'est mon jardin secret."
> 
> I can think of a few expressions in English but they are not too good... Any suggestions?
> 
> Thanks



C'est mon jardin secret = That's my little secret.

This is the English equivalent to "C'est mon jardin secret."


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## la grive solitaire

_It's my own private world?_


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## James Brandon

I prefer the notion of "my own private world" to that of "my own little secret", but I suppose both would be OK. "Jardin secret" does not carry any idea of "a _dirty_ little secret" that one is hiding, by the way and as far as I know - granted, "my own little secret" is not the same as "a dirty secret" either! 

"He lives in a world of his own" goes beyond the idea of "le jardin secret", but there is also a link, I suppose. "Un jardin secret" can refer to one's secret desires and _dreams_ - not in the guilty sense, but in the sense of those being intensely private.


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## DBlomgren

After reading three threads on _jardin secret_ and _jardin intérieur_, I like "private world" as the best translation.

An example: "_Une large majorité des femmes estiment que les hommes aujourd'hui savent suffisament respecter la liberté et le jardin secret de leur compagne._"

I wonder if it could even mean "privacy" in this case.


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## James Brandon

I suppose "a private passion" might be another option, but only when talking about a pastime (e.g.: collecting exotic insects). 

Of all the suggestions, "(my) own private world" does sound like the best to me (see Grive's contribution). 

"Privacy" is too general and too abstract, with a hint of legalese about it (cf one's "right to privacy"); I do not think it works. In French, there is not really a word for it, but one would say "(le droit au) respect de la vie privée", I believe.


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## Muniam

Now I am confused!

I've heard "secret garden"  several time in English. Was it only referring (literally) to a secret garden on a property, or is it some kind on French expression directly translated in English and used in Quebec.


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## James Brandon

Now, that is interesting, but I cannot say I have heard it here in England, and no one on this Thread has suggested a straight and literal translation that would capture the meaning of the French - which does not mean it is inconceivable, of course. 

Could it be a local/Quebec/Canadian use of the expression, under the influence of the French? 

An internet search with "secret garden" in English throws up mostly references to literary and musical works (with the phrase in the title), plus a few slang meanings (which relate to hair-related matters with regard to females, and other meanings that you can imagine ...).

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Secret%20Garden

Other contributors may care to comment on the use of 'secret garden' in English.


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## xtrasystole

Robert & Collins gives:
♦ c'est mon jardin secret (fig) those are my private secrets


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## James Brandon

I do not think, however, that "private secrets" (as opposed to "_public_ secrets"?!) is a good rendering of the term in French. It was discussed in the thread back in 2006, in fact.


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## Muniam

I think I can Explain why I heard/used secret Garden. 

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0108071/

This is the story in which the young heroes discover a secret garden that they restore back to life while they keep it secret to the grown-up...

Might have been enough to put mislead me what they do is strikingly close to what a secret garden is in French.


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## James Brandon

Well, that is an interesting plot, where "a secret garden" (literally, i.e. a garden that was locked away, as part of a property) becomes the character's "jardin secret"... 

Having said that, the secret garden in question is, literally and essentially, a _garden_, as opposed to an idiomatic _expression_...

I can see that "private secret" could be used to describe the garden, from the girl's standpoint.


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## wawa0708

I have heard the term "secret passion" before, referring to a hobby or activity that one doesn't publicize. That seems to fit perfectly here.


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## James Brandon

In some cases, "secret passion" would translate the French adequately. However, as I understand, in some other cases, "jardin secret" in French does not refer to a hobby or activity - it can be quite a bit more subtle than that. 

It could be, say, that someone cares about something without others knowing about it, and without that thing being "a passion" as such. It could be, say, that someone has inherited a rare collection of books and has kept it in his house, and looks at those books from time to time, and calls it "mon jardin secret". 

It could be that someone is of, say, Armenian descent, and it is not obvious from his name, and no one knows about it, and he calls it "mon jardin secret".


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## Jardin Secret

Dear community,

In French they have a beautiful expression: mon jardin secret.
The literal translation is secret garden.
But the real meaning could be rendered into English as _one's own little secret_ or _one's private world_. 

And it made me look for/think about similar expressions or idioms in English.
But it is hard. I couldn't really find words that cover the same meaning. 

Here is an example of how it is used:
A famous lawyer spends all his weekends reading Ancient Greek poetry, and no one knows it except his wife and closest friends. He'd say: "C'est mon jardin secret" [=It's my secret garden]. 

Here is a WR thread to understand the deeper meaning:
jardin secret

I am not asking for a list of synonyms. In fact it would be admirable if you found 1 English expression/idiom that covers this meaning. 

So I hope you can help out.

Thank you.

Ps: a moderator deleted my last thread and asked me to expand my question. I hope this suffices.


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## Juju333

williamtmiller said:


> Hello,
> 
> I was giving an English lesson today and one of my students asked how to say "jardin secret" in English. I had a blank--any ideas. The context is the things that teenagers prefer to keep for themselves, in private.
> thanks


Sorry I just felt the need to point this out, because this is something I used to say too, but I don't think you can say "I had a blank", I think the proper way of saying this is "I drew a blank".


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## Locape

Welcome to the WR forums, @Jardin Secret!  
I think there's several expressions in English to cover the various contexts. From what I read previously in this thread, I'll say 'secret passion' in your example.


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## Keith Bradford

_The Secret Garden_ (1911) is a classic of English children's literature by Frances Hodgson Burnett, filmed five times and serialised six times for television.  So the phrase itself will probably be familiar to most educated English speakers.  But it* is* a physical garden in that book and is applied less often as a metaphor.

The slang meaning "vagina" mentioned in #17 is an example of the way in which almost any word can be given a sexual meaning, perhaps encouraged in this instance by an echo of _The Perfumed Garden_ - a late mediaeval sex manual written in Tunisia and republished in paperback in the 1960s.  The metaphor was revived by Nancy Friday in _My Secret Garden_ (1973) - a compilation of women's sexual fantasies. So perhaps the word-for-word English translation of _c'est mon jardin secret_ should be avoided?


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## ain'ttranslationfun?

"My special place"? (But that too could be interpreted as referring to a vagina, as Keith B said...)


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## Jardin Secret

Thank you for your answers. I am not really searching for a word-for-word translation. I am curious if there is an English idiom that has the same meaning. The words used could be completely different. 

I wouldn't mind idioms in other languages either.


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## Jardin Secret

I understand this is a very hard question. Could you guys maybe refer me to a place where they might have an answer to my question?


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## kristenann

xtrasystole said:


> Robert & Collins gives:
> ♦ c'est mon jardin secret (fig) those are my private secrets


What if someone says…  « J'ignore tes jardins secrets chérie »??


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## ain'ttranslationfun?

Welcome, kristenann! Could you provide more context, please?


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## Le Gallois bilingue

_One’s inner thoughts _might be a possibility.


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## Locape

kristenann said:


> What if someone says…  « J'ignore tes jardins secrets chérie »??


I would rather say 'je ne connais pas ton jardin secret, (ma) chérie'.


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## James Brandon

If you translate the latest suggestion from French into English literally, with the negative, as in: _I don't know your secret garden, darling_, I would say it would sound quite explicitly (or could sound rather explicitly) sexual, thanks to double-entendre and all that (and I am imagining a situation, say, where a man is addressing a woman).

There were many good suggestions for 'jardin secret' in the original Thread (further up).


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## Graine de Moutarde

maybe "I know nothing of your innermost thoughts and feelings." 

Maybe more poetic would be, instead of "secret garden,' "what lies in your secret heart"? Not commonly said, I don't think, but I'd still understand what was meant.


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## Notafrog

A couple of thoughts here: "guilty pleasure" would work in some but not all contexts. The implication is that you keep your garden secret because people might make fun of you over it or otherwise disapprove.
Alternatively, why not just "secret world", or more poetically, "secret realm"?


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## ain'ttranslationfun?

"your innermost thoughts" (i.e. à la G d M's #34 ); "the real you".


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