Better reading French

Better Reading FRENCHP
Better Reading
FRENCH
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Better Reading
FRENCH
A Reader and Guide to Improving Your
Understanding of Written French
Annie Heminway
Copyright © 2003 by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. Manufactured in the United States of
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DOI: 10.1036/007142511X
Contents
Preface xi
How to use this book xiii
Embrasse-moi
Les petits mots d’amour
A game of love, Valentine’s Day cards, and proverbs about love
L’horoscope Horoscopes—Western and Chinese
3
5
Les petites annonces classées
Looking for love in the classifieds
9
L’amour éternel
A letter from Juliette Drouet to Victor Hugo
11
La vie romantique
A letter from George Sand to Alfred de Musset
13
L’amour au théâtre
Molière’s pursuit of the perfect expression of love
16
L’amour et les chats Chateaubriand’s love of cats
18
L’amour et le chocolat For the love of chocolate
20
L’adieu A farewell poem by Apollinaire
23
v
vi
|
Contents
Écris-moi
Les notes Sticky notes, to-do lists, e-mail, a love letter,
a “Dear John” letter, postcards, and a wedding invitation
27
Échanges entre voisins
Correspondence—neighborly and not so neighborly
36
Correspondance administrative A letter to city hall
39
Lettre de cachet An official request
40
Lettres historiques
41
Letters from the battlefield
Runes The magic of writing
44
Haïkus
Poetry in three lines
46
Poème
A prose poem by Frank Smith
47
Nourris-moi
La panoplie du chef A chef’s stock-in-trade
51
Recettes Three recipes, beginning with dessert
53
Portrait de chef
59
Guy Martin of Le Grand Véfour
Questions aux chefs
Interviews with three famous Parisian chefs
Les critiques culinaires
Cuisine et littérature
A guide to Parisian restaurants
Déjeuner with Proust
61
64
66
Les manières de table Eating do’s and don’ts in the 1800s
67
Le menu A Moroccan restaurant in New York City
69
Enivrez-vous An invitation from Baudelaire
71
Contents
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vii
Chante, chante
À la claire fontaine
A seventeenth-century soldier’s lament
75
Le temps des cerises
Politics and love in a nineteenth-century song
77
Les roses blanches Lyrical white roses for maman
79
Carmen
Romance in Bizet’s opera
82
Le chant grégorien Centuries-old plainsong
85
L’Olympia Resurrecting a musical theater in Paris
87
Le Musée de la Musique
A museum of musical instruments
89
Interview avec Fabien Anselme
A young songwriter from Lyons
92
Nous n’irons plus au bois
A song based on a nineteenth-century poem
96
Emmène-moi
La France des musées Museums—old and new
99
Les musées ruraux
Bread, bees, and ostriches in the countryside
103
Les musées urbains Fabric and fashion in the city
107
Les maisons d’artistes The artist’s spirit lives on
112
Le Paris des jardins The green space of Paris
117
viii
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Contents
Emmène-moi au bout du monde
L’esprit TGV
Save time—take the train
123
Dossier pratique No car? No problem.
125
Un voyage d’affaires Doing business in Venice
128
L’Orient-Express
A history of the train of myth and mystique
129
Un tour en montgolfière Up, up, and away
134
Paris bohème A stroll through 1920s Montparnasse
138
Théodore Monod
A scientist and humanitarian whose passion was the desert
140
Alexandra David-Néel Pages from an explorer’s journal
143
Le vent dans le nez
A poem by Jean-Pierre Devant de Martin
146
Fais-moi explorer
Les inventions
Hot-air balloons, garbage cans, Braille, and robots
149
L’euro Technology in your pocket
154
Les vitraux Craftsmanship in the restoration of stained glass
157
Marie Curie, une pionnière du prix Nobel au
Panthéon The first woman to join the nation’s “great men”
160
Médecins Sans Frontières Relieving the world’s suffering
164
Adolphe Sax The highs and lows of an inventor’s life
167