Loanwords of French Literature

Group 3

Rita Wang 100501067

Maggie Sun 99050

FABLIAUOrigin : from Old French

(Picard dialect)  fabliaux

Meaning: A short comic or satiric tale with middle-class or low-class characters. Usually deals with ribald.

Example: Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales “The Miller’s Tale”

CHANSON DE GESTEOrigin – French

Meaning: Songs of heroic deeds

chanson→ “song” ; geste→ “actions, exploits”

Example: Chanson de Roland

BURLESQUEOrigin - mid 17th century : from French

Meaning: from Italian burlesco, from burla ”a joke, ridicule or mockery”. →A literary, dramatic or musical work to cause laughter

Example : 16th century : Francesco Berni’s Opere burlesche

CONFIDANTOrigin : mid 17th

century : (French) confidente “having full trust”

Meaning: A minor character that has the full trust of the protagonist

Examples: Horatio in Hamlet, Watson in the Sherlock Holmes stories

NOUVEAU RICHEOrigin - French, literally

'new rich‘

Meaning: The “new rich” →People who have suddenly risen to a higher economic status but has not gained social acceptance of others in that class.

Example: the d'Urberville family in Tess of the D'Urbervilles

CLICH’EOrigin – mid 19 th century : French

“printing plate”

Something overused to the point that it loses its original effect

"The first man to compare the cheeks of a young woman to a rose was obviously a poet; the first to repeat it was possibly an idiot."

(Salvador Dali)

MOTIFOrigin - mid 19th century: from

French ‘motif’

Of music, narrative, visual arts, textile arts

Literature : Main idea or theme

DENOUEMENTOrigin - mid 18th century:

French dénouement, from dénouer 'unknot‘

Final part of the play when matters are resolved

i.e. Shakespearean plays the death of one or more

MONOLOGUEOrigin - mid 17th

century: from French, from Greek monologos 'speaking alone‘

a long speech by one actor in a play or film to express their thoughts

Hamlet’s “To be or not to be…”

HAMLET:To be, or not to be: that is the question:Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to sufferThe slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,And by opposing end them? To die: to sleep;No more; and by a sleep to say we endThe heart-ache and the thousand natural shocksThat flesh is heir to, 'tis a consummationDevoutly to be wish'd. To die, to sleep;To sleep: perchance to dream: ay, there's the rub;For in that sleep of death what dreams may comeWhen we have shuffled off this mortal coil,Must give us pause: there's the respectThat makes calamity of so long life….

RENAISSANCE

Origin – from French ‘renaissance’

Rebirth

Impulse toward the achievement of ancient Greek and Rome

Artistic Creativity / Zest of life / human worth

REFERENCES

Wikipedia

Oxford Dictionary

A Glossary of Literary Terms, M.H. Abrams