# EN: Ma sœur et moi sommes aussi jalouses l'une que l'autre



## drassum

Bonsoir à tous,

Quelqu'un pourrait-il me donner une, ou quelques traductions correctes pour la phrase suivante:

Ma soeur et moi sommes aussi jalouses l'une que l'autre.

Je pensais à :

1 My sister is as jealous as I am.

2 My sister and I are equally jealous. (je doute que celle-ci soit juste...)

Pensez-vous à autre chose de plus correct? 

D'avance je vous remercie infiniment pour votre aide.


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## wandle

Trois suggestions afin de garder l'equilibre et la reciprocité du texte:

My sister and I are as jealous as one another.
My sister and I are each as jealous as the other.
My sister and I are both equally jealous.


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## Maître Capello

Ta phrase № 1 est correcte du point de vue grammatical, mais c'est la traduction de _Ma sœur est aussi jalouse que moi_, ce qui donne un point de vue très légèrement différent.

On peut remarquer que *la très grande majorité des anglophones* utilisera de préférence le pronom _me_, *même si c'est incorrect grammaticalement parlant !* → _My sister is as jealous as *me*._ (Cf. EN: Mon frère est moins vieux que moi)

Quoi qu'il en soit, pour traduire plus exactement la phrase de départ du point de vue de la structure grammaticale, ta seconde phrase convient très bien. 



wandle said:


> My sister and I are as jealous as one another.
> My sister and I are each as jealous as the other.
> My sister and I are both equally jealous.


The “each” in your second sentence and the “both” in the third sound redundant to me. Would you really say that? I mean, naturally…


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## wandle

Yes, both are natural English, and were chosen in order to reflect the emphasis of the original better than drassum's version 2.


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## Maître Capello

OK, thanks for the clarification. 

By the way, note that “My sister and I are *each* as jealous as the other.” would be translated as _Ma sœur et moi sommes *chacune* aussi jalouses l'une que l'autre_.


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## Keith Bradford

Maître Capello said:


> ...The “each” in your second sentence and the “both” in the third sound redundant to me. Would you really say that? I mean, naturally…



The "each" in _My sister and I are each as jealous as the other _is essential - without it we'd have My _sister and I are as jealous as the other _(_ma soeur et moi sommes aussi jalouses que l'autre personne _...qu'on n'a pas nommée).

On the other hand, I find _My sister and I are both equally jealous _to be incorrect (though one often hears it).  Either _both _or _equally _is superfluous; the meaning changes according to which word you remove.


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## wandle

Granted, the meaning changes with each word removed: but that indicates there is no redundancy.


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## CapnPrep

Maître Capello said:


> By the way, note that “My sister and I are *each* as jealous as the other.” would be translated as _Ma sœur et moi sommes *chacune* aussi jalouses l'une que l'autre_.


I don't agree with this; there is an extra pronoun in your French version.


wandle said:


> Granted, the meaning changes with each word removed: but that indicates there is no redundancy.


The question is whether the meaning changes if you just remove _both_:

My sister and I are both equally jealous. 
My sister and I are both equally jealous. 
In my opinion, these two sentences mean the same thing(s), so I think _both_ is redundant. But that doesn't automatically mean that it's incorrect, and even if we decide that sentence #1 is incorrect, the fact remains that it sounds completely natural to many speakers.

The following threads may be of interest to drassum:
autant + adj l'un(e) que l'autre
as kind as each other (English Only)


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## Maître Capello

CapnPrep said:


> there is an extra pronoun in your French version.


That was my point! (That is, if by "pronoun" you mean _chacune_.) To me, the "each" emphasizes the reciprocity as _chacune_ does in French…


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## Keith Bradford

Thank you Capn, you took my meaning perfectly.

However, I will still maintain that _My sister and I are both equally jealous _doesn't really make sense. Let's take two parallel sentences:

My sister and I are both naturally blonde (= I am naturally blonde and my sister is too).
My sister and I are both equally jealous (= I am equally jealous and my sister is too ????). Not really. But it is a common error.


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## CapnPrep

Maître Capello said:


> To me, the "each" emphasizes the reciprocity as _chacune_ does in French…


When you hear/read the first part of the sentence, you might expect _each_ to have a distributive meaning (e.g. _My sister and I each… have five kids_), but by the time you get the whole sentence, it becomes clear that _each… the other_ just means _each other_ / _one another_. All of these are equivalent to _l'un(e)… l'autre_. I think your French sentence corresponds more closely to _My sister and I are each as jealous as one another_, which I find ungrammatical, but maybe other speakers accept it.


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## wandle

"The question is whether the meaning changes if you just remove both:
   1. My sister and I are both equally jealous.
   2. My sister and I are equally jealous."

I submit 'both' makes good sense in context. 
'Aussi jalouses l'une que l'autre'  expresses a reciprocal comparison.
On the other hand, 'My sister and I are equally jealous' could just as well express comparison with a third party. The inclusion of 'both' helps narrow it down to the two persons.


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## wistou

wandle said:


> "The question is whether the meaning changes if you just remove both:
> 1. My sister and I are both equally jealous.
> 2. My sister and I are equally jealous."
> 
> I submit 'both' makes good sense in context.
> 'Aussi jalouses l'une que l'autre'  expresses a reciprocal comparison.
> On the other hand, 'My sister and I are equally jealous' could just as well express comparison with a third party. The inclusion of 'both' helps narrow it down to the two persons.



By the way, the ambiguity you mention already existed in the French version :

"Ma sœur et moi sommes aussi jalouses l'une que l'autre"  does not make it obvious that  they are jealous  "l'une de l'autre"

"Ma sœur et moi sommes aussi jalouses l'une que l'autre *de notre frère ainé*"  is fully correct, (and could be carried by the context). 

To remove all ambiguity, we would need something like: 

"Ma soeur et moi sont sommes également jalouses l'une de l'autre"
ou 
"Ma soeur et moi sommes jalouses l'une de l'autre au même degré"


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## wandle

We're really getting down to detail here. By 'a reciprocal comparison' I had not meant to imply jealousy of each other, just jealousy equal to each other's.


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## Maître Capello

CapnPrep said:


> When you hear/read the first part of the sentence, you might expect _each_ to have a distributive meaning (e.g. _My sister and I each… have five kids_), but by the time you get the whole sentence, it becomes clear that _each… the other_ just means _each other_ / _one another_. All of these are equivalent to _l'un(e)… l'autre_. I think your French sentence corresponds more closely to _My sister and I are each as jealous as one another_, which I find ungrammatical, but maybe other speakers accept it.


It makes sense. I hadn't realized _each_ was correlated to _the other_ since they are usually written next to each other (← like here ).

Anyway, regarding the meaning of the French sentence, it had never crossed my mind that the two sisters could be jealous of each other…


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## Assurancetourix

wandle said:


> "The question is whether the meaning changes if you just remove both:
> On the other hand, 'My sister and I are equally jealous' could just as well express comparison with a third party. The inclusion of 'both' helps narrow it down to the two persons.



I'm not sure I agree - as I see it if _both _isn't going to be completely redundant it has to be because it would be possible for one sister to be equally jealous, which means that the comparison has to be with another person. So in my view the position is the exact opposite of what you are saying. In other words:

Jane is really jealous
Actually, my sister is equally jealous
Actually, we're both equally jealous (she's as jealous as Jane and so am I)

I'm really jealous
Actually, my sister is equally jealous
? So we're both equally jealous (she's as jealous as me and so am I - nonsensical - or maybe she's as jealous as me and I'm as jealous as her - obviously redundant).

By the same token, you couldn't start this monologue with "I'm equally jealous".


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## zoetsa

Well... Girl1 n Girl2 can be both jealous without being jealous to an equal degree. SO equally is NOT redundant at all.


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## drassum

Thank you very much for your detailed answers!


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## Assurancetourix

@zoetsa, I don't think anyone said _equally _was redundant exactly. Post 6 says that either _both _or _equally _is superfluous and I would agree. If you ditch _both _you get _my sister and I are equally jealous_, which makes sense, and if you ditch _equally _you get _my sister and I are both jealous. _This also makes sense but has a different meaning. The point is just that, strictly speaking, it's a mistake to put in _both _when you already have _equally_. I agree with you that for our meaning (i.e. the two sisters are jealous to the same degree) we need _equally _and it is not at all redundant.


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## zoetsa

Did I say that someone said it? :-o
 (But the someone(s) said something... )


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## wandle

It still seems to me that 'My sister and and I are equally jealous' fails to translate 'Ma sœur et moi sommes aussi jalouses l'une que l'autre', because it does not express the reciprocity of the French. The balancing effect of 'both equally' supplies that missing element.
Chambers Dictionary
gives the meaning of 'both' as: 'the two; the one and the other'.
If we substitute the latter for 'both', we get:
'My sister and I are, the one and the other, equally jealous'.
This spells out what I submit is a faithful rendering of the original.


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