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#1European French by Aimerais
European FrenchEnglish

L'amour est un oiseau rebelle
Que nul ne peut apprivoiser,
Et c'est bien en vain qu'on l'appelle,
S'il lui convient de refuser.
L'amour est enfant de bohème,
Il n'a jamais, jamais connu de loi;
Si tu ne m'aimes pas, je t'aime;
Si je t'aime, prends garde à toi!

Love is a rebellious bird
That none can tame,
And it is well in vain that one calls him*
If it suits him* to refuse
Love is a gypsy's child,
It has never, never known the law;
If you do not love me, I love you;
If I love you, look out for yourself!

* him = love / the bird

DICTIONARY

aimervb.to love
amourn-masc.love (abstract idea)
apprivoiservb.to tame
avoirvb-irr.to have
bienadv.well
bohèmen-masc.gypsy, Bohemian
ceprn.this, it
connuvb-irr.past participle of connaître 'to know, to know of, to be familiar with'
convientvb-irr.3rd person singular present of convenir 'to suit'
deprep.of
enfantn-masc.child
etcnj.and
en vainadv.in vain
êtrevb-irr.to be
garden-
ilprn.he, it (nominative)
loin-fem.law
luiprn.he, it (indirect object)
nulprn.no one, nobody
oiseaun-masc.bird
onprn.one
pouvoirvb-irr.to be able to
prendrevb-irr.to take
prendre garde àvb.from prendre + garde + à; to look out for
quesubj-cnj.that
rebelleadj.rebellious
refuservb.to refuse
sicnj.if (contracts to s' before il, ils)
tuprn.you (singular informal)

GRAMMAR

Word Order

French is mainly SVO, with one exception:

  • if a personal pronoun is in the object position, the order is SOV.

Adjectives generally come after head words. The general noun phrase order is preposition + article + noun + adjective(s).

Besides this, French syntax is more or less similar to English.

Nouns

Two noun genders exist, masculine and feminine.

Agreement exists, but is not displayed in this text.

Two numbers exist, singular and plural. Plurals do not appear in this text.

Verbs

In French, verbs agree with the person and number of the subject of the sentence. The pronoun 'je' is 1st person singular; the pronouns 'il' and 'elle' are 3rd person singular. All other nouns in this passage are 3rd person singular or plural.

For the purposes of this text, all verbs in the passage are in the indicative mood.

The past tense is formed using an auxiliary verb. Most verbs use the auxiliary verb avoir, while reflexive verbs, as well as certain verbs of motion, use the verb être. After this, the past participle of the verb appears.

Below is a (simplified) verb conjugation table for the present tense. The first column represents a regular verb 'verber.' The other columns represent common irregular verbs.

Infverb-erêtreavoirpouvoir
1sverb-esuisaipeux
2sverb-esesaspeux
3sverb-eestapeut
1plverb-onssommesavonspouvons
2plverb-ezêtesavezpouvez
3plverb-entsontontpeuvent
past p.verb-éétéeupu

Negation

Negative sentences require two components:

  • a negative word (may appear anywhere in the sentence)
  • the particle 'ne' (comes before the verb)

The following negative constructions appear:

  • nul..ne nobody
  • ne..jamais never
  • ne..pas (does) not

Pronouns


1p 2p 3p sing. masc. 3p sing. fem.
nom. je tu il elle
acc. me te le la
dat. me te lui lui
refl. me te se se

Note that there is no direct translation of 'it'—the pronoun is 'il' or 'elle', depending on the gender of its antecedent.

Articles

masc.fem.
indef.unune
def.lela

Articles come before the noun that they modify.

Contractions

Certain short words ending in the vowel -e lose their vowel before vowels.
In the text, the words que, me, ce, le, ne display this behavior; they may contract to qu', m', c', l', n' before vowels.