posted
I want to quote a major war book : The Art of war writen by Sun Tzu. "Military engagement is the last of things to process". I quote from my memory and my translation is not the best.
Military engagement can offer the victory but for a very high cost.
Personnaly, I think war reduce the highness of a nation. Look at the colonial war in Algery for France or The actual Iraq War for USA. We also live in the looking of others. So, with such of attitude, others reduce their opinion about this countries to a lower scale.
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I'm working on my final paper in French, which is on the symbol of Marianne. I keep running into the same problems with capitalization. In the following passage, for instance:
quote: "L'état, c'est moi," dit Louis XIV, et il avait, bien sûr beaucoup d'arrogance, mais aussi de raison. Dans l'ancien régime, l'État était personnifié par le Roi.
Do I capitalize l'État? Do I capitalize Roi? And if, later, I'm talking about la Reine, do I capitalize that? Also, earlier in the paper, I said:
quote: Le nom Marie-Anne combine Marie, le nom de la Vierge, avec Anne, le nom de sa mère, Sainte Anne. Au XVIIIème siècle, c'était les paysans qui préféraient les prénoms des Saints qui sont les objets de dévotion. Les Marie, les Anne, les Madeleine, les Jean-Baptiste, les Paul, sont souvent des paysans. C'étaient les aristocrates, les élites, et parfois les bourgeois, qui essayaient de se distinguer en adoptant les prénoms comme Hercule, Hélène, ou Alexandre.
Should I have capitalized Saints? Or only when it's part of a name like Sainte-Anne? Also, did I do correctly in making the plurals of names in saying "les Jean-Baptiste"?
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posted
If I'm correct, there's no rules of capitalization when you speak of saints or kings. Capitalization is a respect mark, if you put it fine, if you don't, fine too (at last in France, I don't know where your teacher is from). You would indeed shock people by not capitalizing God, for exemple. Your plural of Jean-Baptiste seems fine to me. We never pluralize names.
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posted
I agree with Anna about capitalization and plural. Just help you : Add a "," after "bien sûr" to help the reader to breathe. And others points : You can repeat "beaucoup" after "de raison", if it's what you mean. Or if you think he was more "arrogant" than "raisonnable", you can turn into "Il avait, bien sûr, beaucoup d'arrogance, mais aussi de la raison." then prefer to write "Pendant l'ancien régime". In English, you use "during" which is translated by "pendant". And to finish with your interesting text (I really think that ! ), prefer write "des objets de dévotion" because... I try to search a good explanation... It sound like better ? I can find better... mmh... "les" indicate a way to show the thing exactly, in his "all". "Des" explain a part. Anna, can you help me, please ?
Just i would notice your french is very good. You use perfectly "^" on "sûr" and all my remarks are to "smooth" your text. Beautiful !
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quote:You should hear Welsh/Scottish Highlnders and Alaskans!
I have no idea about Alaskans. But what kind of amuses me is that sometimes foreign immigrants here (New Jersey) can't understand what I say. They can understand a New Jersey accent, but not mine, which is a sort of blend of Pittsburghese, Appalachian, and Pennsylvania Dutch.
[ December 16, 2004, 06:17 AM: Message edited by: Yozhik ]
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