ÿþ<HTML> <HEAD><TITLE>Book review: 100 mots &#224; sauver - Bernard Pivot. </TITLE></HEAD> <BODY BGCOLOR="#3299CC"> <P> <Font size="4"><B>100 mots &#224; sauver - Bernard Pivot</B></Font> <BR>Paris, France : Albin Michel, 2004. <BR> ISBN 2-226-14384-X<BR> Reviewed by Fran&#231;oise Herrmann <BR></P> <P><HR WIDTH=300 Align=CENTER></P> <P><SPACER TYPE="horizontal" SIZE="36"> <P><SPACER TYPE="horizontal" SIZE="36"><I> Au secours! [Help! Save the words!]</I> The premise of this book is quite simple. A great deal of time, energy and money is rightly spent to save endangered species of all kinds. What about words? Don't words have souls? Aren't they also part of our heritage, our culture, our stories? Aren't they closer to us, engraved in our minds and the structure of our egos, than any creature big or small? Riding the tides of this endearing analogy, the illustrious Bernard Pivot, host of the now extinct but immensely popular French literary TV show <I>Apostrophes</I> has resurrected! He brings with him a collection of 100 endangered words. Each word is thoughtfully commented and exemplified in a citation, which he has personally culled, using his voracious appetite for the literary.</P> <IMG HEIGHT=493 WIDTH=315 SRC="100image.JPG" ALIGN=right> <P><SPACER TYPE="horizontal" SIZE="36">Included in this compendium of 100 endangered words are three words that have definitely migrated out of the two most popular French language dictionaries, <I>Le Petit Larousse</I> and the <I>Le Petit Robert</I>. The balance consists of words which appear to him to be just as threatened since they exist indexed as "old fashioned" or "archaic" . You will find among these endangered species a few gems, for which translations appear just as imperiled. <I>"Trotte-menu"</I> [spriteful, daintyfoot] is an invariable adjective, according to Pivot, that describes delicate gait, such as that of mice or <I>"gent trotte-menu"</I> per the 17th century fable writer Lafontaine. Derivatives such as <I>"trotte, trotter, trotteur, trotteuse</I> [the second hand on a watch],<I> trottinement, trottoir, trottiner,</I> and <I>trotinette"</I> are all alive and well. <I>"Trottin"</I> [a messenger], however, is definitely extinct; as Pivot points out, it has been replaced with the term <I>"coursier." </I></P> <P><SPACER TYPE="horizontal" SIZE="36">Another gem is the term <I>"suivez-moi-jeune-homme" </I>[literally "Follow-me-young-man"]. This is a ribbon that floats behind a woman's hat, presumably beckoning the opposite sex, for anyone who is working with the fashion industry! It is also a masculine and invariable noun. And in the action domain of verbs, you will find <I>"s'esbigner"</I>[to skidaddle]. This is an "exiting" pronominal verb, closest in meaning to the verb <I>"s'eclipser"</I> [to slip out] with perhaps the additional connotation of desirable flight.</P> <P><SPACER TYPE="horizontal" SIZE="36">Finally, the verb <I>"seoir"</I> [to befit], the conjugation of which Pivot points out is a nightmare. <I>"Il sied, il seyait, il sierra, qu'il si&#233;e , s&#233;ant</I> (present participle), <I>sis</I> (past participle) etc., the difficulty of which, perhaps, may in the end explain extinction, much in line with the survival of the most practical.</P> <P><SPACER TYPE="horizontal" SIZE="36">Long before Pivot, linguists have gone to faraway places to record languages in danger of extinction. Native American languages, and more recently the languages of Central Siberia such as Middle Chulym, and Tofa, are a case in point among many others worldwide, still dying. The recordings and dictionaries that keep these languages in intensive care and on life support belie a deeper issue of economic and political power struggles. Because the French language is far from imperiled, Pivot's approach is far more romantic, and playful, albeit quite sincere. He succeeds beautifully in making the point quite clearly that when a word is lost, so is a unique slice of meaning that no other word can capture in exactly the same way. Thus, he is convincing in his bid for support to save "word creatures." Furthermore, we can only be deeply saddened and shocked at what this glimpse of extinction at the word level entails on the much larger scale of lost languages. </P> <P><SPACER TYPE="horizontal" SIZE="36">For technical translators, however, it may not make much practical sense to look back at what usage has somehow discarded. If our dictionaries always appear as if they are bursting at the seams, it is not because they have no room for the outmoded and the archaic; it is because they cannot keep up with languages that are very much alive and thriving. The words that we do not find are just being created, and we have no reason to resist the cycle of word life in language. This book is pleasant reading and a charmer for those who may share Pivot's love of words and the French language. You will definitely enjoy discovering and visiting the meaning of lost words and endangered expressions, even if for all practical purposes you may not find them all that useful.</P> <P><SPACER TYPE="horizontal" SIZE="36"></P> <P><B><A HREF="Publications.html">Publications</A></B></P> <P><B><A HREF="Bookrev.html">Reviews</A></B></P> <P><B><A HREF="index.html">Home</A></B></P> </BODY> </HTML>