FELIZ

 

Hacer feliz Make happy

Mi mujer no me hace feliz My wife doesn´t make me happy

Feliz como una perdiz (más feliz que una perdiz) Without a care in the world, happy as can be, happy as a lark (clam)

Estoy más feliz que una perdiz desde que Trump desapareció I am without a care in the world since Trump disappeared / Desde mi divorcio que estoy más feliz que una perdiz Since my divorce I am as happy as can be

Final feliz Happy ending

El matrimonio no tuvo un final feliz The marriage did not have a happy ending

Prometérselas uno muy felices Have happy prospects, high hopes

David se las prometía muy felices cuando le ofrecieron el empleo, pero no sabía lo que se le venía encima David had happy prospects when he was offered the job, not knowing what was coming to him

— “… pero al fin me las prometía muy felices.” José María Guelbenzu, El río de la luna, 1981. Esp.

Y vivieron felices y comieron perdices And they lived happily ever after

Y se casaron y vivieron felices y comieron perdices And they got married and they lived happily ever after

— “… Amalia y Teodoro fueron felices y comieron perdices.” Miguel Romero Esteo, El vodevil de la pálida, pálida, pálida luna, 1979. Esp.

FEAST

 

A feast fit for a king Un festín digno de un rey

It was a feast fit for a king Fue un festín digno de un rey

— “Well then he deserves a feast fit for a king.” Kieran Wasserman, The Battle for Eire, 2005. US.

After a (the) feast (dinner) comes the reckoning Después de un gustazo, un trancazo, al freír será el reír, y al pagar será el llorar

Now we must pay the bill, after a feast comes the reckoning Ahora tenemos que abonar la cuenta, después de un gustazo, un trancazo

— “After the feast comes the reckoning a period of pleasure or indulgence has to be paid for; recorded from the early 17th century, but now chiefly in modern North American use.” Elizabeth Knowles, The Oxford Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, 2006. UK

Feast one´s eyes on Regalarse la vista con

I feasted my eyes on the cakes Me regalé la vista con los pasteles

IT NEVER FAILS...

I´m not going to get into a shaggy-dog story, a complicated, long, and tedious story that is very boring (cuento de la buena pipa), but it never fails, it happens every time, always, (es matemático), whenever I turn the tv set on, soccer is the main subject, and this soccer business is taking its toll on my nerves, causes damages and suffering (me está pasando factura). It is true that these days my outlook on things is from fair to middling, not good but not bad either, so-so,  (regulín-regulán). But I digress...    

FAMILY

 

Be a close-knit family Familia muy unida

David pertenece a una familia muy unida David belongs to a close-knit family

Be from a good family Ser de buena familia

John is from a very good New York family Juan es de una buena familia neoyorquina

Be in the family way Estar en estado de buena esperanza

Is your wife in the family way? ¿Está tu mujer en estado de buena esperanza?

Be like a member of the family (part of the family) Ser de la casa, como de la familia

John is like a member of the family Juan es de la casa

Family jewels Los testículos, genitales

The rock hit him in the family jewels and was taken to the hospital La roca le golpeó en los genitales y le trasladaron al hospital

Family ties Lazos familiares

I have family ties in Hong Kong Tengo lazos familiares en Hong Kong

Happen in the best families Pasar (ocurrir) en las mejores familias

That happens in the best families Eso pasa en las mejores familias

It stays in the family Todo queda en casa

It’s ok by me as long as it stays in the family Me parece bien mientras todo quede en casa

One big, happy family Una familia feliz

The Smiths are one, big happy family Los Smith son una familia feliz

Run in the family Ser (cosa de) de familia, venir de familia

His bad temper runs in the family Su mala leche es de familia

The family that prays together, stays together La familia que reza junta, permanece junta

My priest says that the family that prays together, stays together El cura dice que la familia que reza junta, permanece junta

LO MEJOR - THE BEST

 

Siempre que oigo la frase: "las mejores croquetas del mundo" o "la mejor paella de Zamora", o "el mejor bocadillo de calamares de Madrid" me entra una cierta melancolía. Me apena que se emplee eso de "lo mejor" con tanta alegría a la par de con tanta falta de respeto y de interés científico. El idioma debiera ser preciso y responder a una sólida base fehaciente y demostrable. Emplear las palabras alegremente, sin ton ni son, apesadumbra, entristece y desuela, por lo menos a mí. "El mejor español se habla en X" o "la mejor pronunciación inglesa se oye en X" son frases hueras que nada tienen que ver con la realidad. "Mejor" ya se ha convertido en una palabra hiperbólica que debemos tomar cum grano salis, como decían los latinos. Además, ya sabemos que "the best is the enemy of the good" o "lo mejor es enemigo de lo bueno." Ahí queda eso, para reflexionar cuando te hablen de la "mejor" novela del siglo XXI, o de la "mejor" película del año.   

IRENE VALLEJO Y EL ERROR

 

En su muy interesante artículo sobre el error, intitulado "Fe de erratas" (El País, 4 febrero, 2023), Irene Vallejo lo termina emplazándonos a "no tener miedo al error." ¡Ah! Esta recomendación, aunque buena, me llega tarde. He vivido teniéndole al error no ya miedo, sino pavor. Un calvario al dar conferencias, clases en el aula, al escribir artículos para revistas, componiendo libros y diccionarios, siempre con la sombra, larga y malintencionada del error, de la posible errata, agazapados tras de mí.  No le deseo este Vía Crucis del error a nadie, ni a los gobernantes que tenemos ahora, que ya es decir (aunque a ellos parece no aquejarles esta aflicción.) Además, para ponerlo peor, he tenido que pasarme la vida corrigiendo los errores de los demás, y ya sabemos que a nadie le gusta que le corrijan. He sido más popular en esto que La chata.

Gracias mi admirada Irene Vallejo, pero no puedo seguir su consejo: el error debe evitarse. Y debe evitarse porque demuestra ignorancia, descuido, desidia, dejadez, pereza, o por lo menos eso es lo que se cree por ahí... y lo que yo creo cuando pillo a alguien en el error. Y usted si dice, por ejemplo, he don´t like nothing, se reirán de usted y perderá toda credibilidad intelectual y lingüística. Y no hablemos de people is good. Y eso de perder la credibilidad intelectual ante los demás es cosa muy  peliaguda de sobrellevar. ¿O no?  

EL IMPERATIVO ESPAÑOL

 

El imperativo expresa la voluntad del que habla de que el que escucha ejecute un acto. El oyente es siempre segunda persona singular o plural. Para el resto de las personas emplearemos el subjuntivo:

(tú)                  compra           no compres

(vosotros)        comprad         no compréis.

Oiremos y leeremos el infinitivo: “callar” por “callad”; “tirar” por “tirad”. En los pronominales leeremos siempre sentaros aquí, por sentaos aquí.  Este uso del infinitivo está ya tan arraigado en el idioma que decir “venid aquí” por “venir aquí” parece engolado y barroco. Usted haga lo que quiera.

(De mi Hablar y escribir con corrección, 2ª Ed., Editatum, 2022.)

MUSICOPHILIA AND LANGUAGE LEARNING

Sauntering about town, watching traffic jams, skirting bicycles and skateboarders on sidewalks, I often catch myself humming. Waiting for a traffic light to change, fellow pedestrians pull their eyes away from their cell phone screens and stare at me as a weirdo. Someone humming a tune in public is suspect nowadays. But I digress.

The lowdown about this humming business is that the tunes that come to my mind while strolling are usually jingles and bits of children’s songs that my grandfather and my mother sang to me at the onset of my life. Often, I cannot recall from whom, or even when, I heard those songs that clutter my mind, but they are there, ready to pop up and bring a smile to my otherwise sullen face. Oliver Sacks refers to this phenomenon as “Musical hallucinations” in his book Musicophilia: Tales of Music and the Brain.

Now I know the great benefits of putting music and words together. Children’s songs have catchy music to them, and simple, sometimes nonsensical, lyrics that get glued to our brains and stay there for years. Children do not make an effort to learn them. They just listen, enjoy and learn. That simple.

As habits are changing, parents seem to spend less time with their offspring. Some grandparents are taking over, but still, they do not invest time with their grandchildren as they used to. We do not seem to realize that kids need time with parents and grandparents, but parents and grandparents also need time with their children. Notice the recurrent words: parents, grandparents, children, kids… Ponder on this.

To preserve the lore handed down from generation to generation in your family and in order to offer your child the gift of another language, sing along with them in Spanish. You will be sharing emotions, feelings, and memories in the songs and lyrics of your childhood.

Not all is lost. Internet offers the possibility to relive children’s songs from all over the world… at our fingertips. Give it a try and sing along with your child and recapture the solace and benefits of song sharing with your kids. 

CHILDREN AND TWO LANGUAGES AT HOME

 We were spending the summer at a gated community, outside the city, and my son Oscar was about four years old. Children had the run of the place and were having a blast. He had made many friends his age, and spent all day cycling, swimming, and playing soccer... We were new to the place that year.

One day I was strolling along and saw Oscar with some buddies. I approached the circle and said something to him in ENGLISH, the language I have communicated with my children with since they were born. All the children stared at me wide-eyed. Their eyes grew even wider when they heard him answer in what, for them at that time, was a strange language. And for the first time in his life, Oscar realized that speaking two languages at home was not “normal” and that the rest of the families spoke only one. Up to that point in his short life, he had not realized that bilingual families were not the norm.

After this incident, Oscar stopped talking to me in English. He did not enjoy being “different” and wanted to be like his peers. He wanted to belong to his group of friends and had no desire to be a language freak.

I paid no attention and kept on speaking in English to him and to his sisters, and ignored his Spanish. I explained nothing. I understood then that children want to be “normal”, like everybody else, like their peers. After a few weeks, he came back to English and our bilingual life kept sailing along in fair weather.

But that happened a long time ago. Things are different now, both in Spain and in the United States, the two countries I know best. Out of that experience, let me offer the following:

1.     Make sure your child gets the idea that speaking two, or even three languages, is normal and better. Tune in to radio or TV programs in both languages to make your point.

2.     Do not let his peers or society beat him down because you people speak several languages. Bi-linguists are not different or weird, they are better. Persist in this at all cost.

Parents must take pride in their heritage of origin and in their newly acquired culture. The Spanish Heritage has nothing to envy Anglo-Saxon culture or any other, and vice versa, of course.

4.     Once the child perceives that her parents are proud of, say, the Spanish language, and that they use it indoors and outdoors, anywhere, she will feel the pride and advantage of being bilingual.

5.     The plasticity of children’s brains is awesome and can adapt to anything and acquire anything… but pride and dignity will help them lose the fear of speaking any language, anywhere, anytime.

Go for it!  

THE FUTURE OF SPANGLISH

Heraclitus of Ephesus, the Greek man of wisdom who lived five hundred years before Christ, said, observing nature, “everything is in a state of flux”, meaning that everything is forever changing and that no man ever steps in the same river twice because the water is ever flowing. The nature of the universe is change, movement, development and nothing is static.

 Language cannot escape the dictum of the Greek philosopher in its natural change and evolution. However, the laws of linguistic change are often stymied by outside forces and circumstances that impede the inherent development of language.

 When two tongues live together and share the same territory inhabited by the same people, a new phenomenon of change occurs in phonology, grammar and vocabulary. This factor is unavoidable and difficult to deal with or even halt. The use of two languages in daily social intercourse poses challenges that one-language societies do not have or even understand.

 Since 1898 Puerto Rico has been battling to preserve the purity of the Spanish language, and its people must be given full credit for having withstood the fierce attacks of English to colonize the Island. Puerto Rico is an example of being more puritanical in its Spanish language habits than other Spanish-speaking countries, including Spain, the most lax in the purity of language matters. In Spain almost everything goes. Not so in Puerto Rico.

 In Quebec, Canada, Saturday and Sunday are known as le fin de semain whereas in France those two days are called le weekend. Quebeckers are much more careful with their native language than the French themselves because they have the menace of English. Frenchmen are lax with their language whereas the Quebecois are careful and strict in the use of la langue de Molière.

 The influence of English in the Spanish employed by bilingual Americans is a natural development of linguistic influence. Many linguistically uneducated immigrants say troca for truck, camión, or marqueta for market, mercado, or even liquear, leak, instead of gotear, but as their children go to school and learn real English and Spanish, they will become purists in both languages. We all know that, after all is said and done, young people are more traditional and puristic than older generations. Once they discover in the classroom that llamar p’atrás is not an acceptable translation of to call back, but devolver la llamada, they will shun it like the plague. New bilingual generations of Americans will discover through education that the English and Spanish spoken at home are not the real educated languages, and that rufo, roof, is in fact techo.

 The United States has a unique and great opportunity of becoming a truly bilingual nation where Spanglish will be relegated to the lower educated classes, the language of older folks who had no educational opportunities. New, young generations perceive that two is better than one in language matters and that true education begins with a good and deep knowledge of the four traditional skills: speaking, understanding, reading and writing.

In my opinion there will be a backlash of puritanical offensive against Spanglish by newer generations of educated bilingual Americans.

 A bilingual English and Spanish United States could again rule the world.

CURSO DE LA UNED: PRAGMÁTICA DE LA LENGUA INGLESA

Of late I have been toying with the idea of going back to school so as to keep my neurons on track and on their toes. I thought I would try La UNED (Universidad Nacional de Educación a Distancia). It is a severe and prestigious university. I must keep up to speed with the times and new tendencies in my field. So I looked at the department´s offering and this subject caught my eye: Pragmática de la Lengua Inglesa (pertenece a la materia denominada Lenguaje y Comunicación.)

The course description is this:

"Esta asignatura pretende formar a los estudiantes en el conocimiento de los principios que regulan el uso del lenguaje en la comunicación humana en lengua inglesa. Se hará especial hincapié en las condiciones que determinan el empleo del lenguaje y los enunciados apropiados por parte de hablantes concretos en situaciones comunicativas reales, así como su interpretación por parte de los correspondientes receptores. Por tanto, los estudiantes habrán de familiarizarse con los principales conceptos de la pragmática en lengua inglesa, empezando en primer lugar por acotar el terreno de estudio de esta disciplina para pasar posteriormente a estudiar algunas de las principales aproximaciones y teorías propuestas dentro de la misma. A través de este estudio, la asignatura está encaminada a desarrollar la capacidad analítica y crítica del alumno, al utilizar el conocimiento teórico no solamente para analizar el significado de la parte meramente lingüística de los enunciados empleados por los hablantes de la lengua inglesa, sino también el significado contextual más profundo que incluye la situación que acompaña a dichos enunciados, teniendo muy en cuenta la dimensión (inter)cultural. De esta manera se espera también despertar en el alumno una sensibilidad, apertura mental y respeto por los distintos comportamientos lingüísticos y culturales de nuestro planeta."

I was taken aback. If I cannot understand the course description in Spanish, you can well imagine how bewildered I would be trying to "analizar los enunciados de los hablantes de la lengua inglesa." I guess I am beyond help and irretrievably lost in the new system of "enunciados."  

FÁCIL

 

Ser fácil de Be easy to

Eso es fácil de hacer That´s easy to do

Ser fácil de decir Be easy to say, easier said than done

Eso es fácil de decir, pero no de hacer That´s easier said than done

— “Eso es fácil de decir pero difícil de cumplir.” Jorge Almeida, Cómo cuidar un niño, 1975. Arg.

Ser fácil que Be likely to, possible

Es fácil que Juan venga el jueves John is likely to come Thursday

— “... es fácil que el caso de Juan Diego se convierta en una estadística más...” El Tiempo, 24/9/1996. Colom.

Tenerlo fácil Have it easy

Lo tienes fácil porque tu padre es rico You have it easy because your father is rich

— “Con Lupe lo tienes fácil; a esa por un pico te la tiras cuando quieras.” Rafael Mendizábal, Mala yerba, 1989. Esp.

PHONÉTICA INGLESA

George Bernard Shaw, en su Prefacio a Pygmalion, A Professor of Phonetics, que luego fue una película, My Fair Lady, escribió sobre las dificultades de la fonética y ortografía inglesas: “The English have no respect for their language, and will not teach their children to speak it. They spell it so abominably that no man can teach himself what it sounds like. It is impossible for an Englishman to open his mouth without making some other Englishman hate or despise him.” Esto lo escribió en 1916, y lo podía haber escrito hoy. Todo sigue igual. Y lo que es peor: no puede cambiar.

Creerás que es una perogrullada que explique que el lenguaje es sonido, voz viva, oralidad, y que por eso una lengua se considera muerta cuando ya nadie la habla. Digo esto porque hay muchos que creen que el aprendizaje de un idioma extranjero se basa sólo en frases, en cuestiones gramaticales, y no enfatizan lo más importante: el sonido, la pronunciación correcta. Luego pasa lo que pasa: que no nos entiende nadie. Parece como si estudiásemos inglés, por ejemplo, sólo para leerlo y escribirlo, no para hablarlo, para comunicar por medio de la voz.

(Introducción a mi Phonetica inglesa, Oberón.)

MARIO VARGAS LLOSA ET L´ACADÉMIE FRANÇAISE

 

A mon avis, l´Academie Française est une institution de grand prestige en France et aussi, naturellement, dehors d´elle. Et aussi à mon avis, Mr. Mario Vargas Llosa et un grand écrivain... mais, hélas, en espagnol. Pour ça je ne comprende pas que fait Mr. Vargas Llosa á l´ Académie. Com diría un valencià, tanca la porta i anem-nos!

THE MONARCHY AND SPANISH

 

Except for two short Republics and a long Dictatorship, Spain has been and is a Constitutional Monarchy. Felipe VI is the present king. And of all 22 Spanish-speaking countries it is the only monarchy, the rest being republics or dictatorships. And yet, references to the institution abound in all those countries where lovers refer to one another as "mi rey, rey mío, mi reina, reina mía" and in every one of those countries the babyboy is "el rey de la casa", and not the "presidente de la casa." The babygirl is, of course, "la princesa (reina) de la casa" and will be referred to as "mi princesa" or "princesa mía" by either parent. I could go on and on, but I have made my point: language has nothing to do with politics or forms of government. And all Hispanic teenagers dream of a "príncipe azul" to come and sweep them off their feet.  

ORDEAL VS ORDALÍA

 In English and Spanish, there are words that are the same, with the same etymology, with the same meaning, but more currency in one language than in the other. A case in point to illustrate this idea is the words "ordeal" and "ordalía". 

ORDEAL: "a primitive form of trial to determine guilt or innocence by subjecting the accused person to fire, poison, or other serious danger, the result being regarded as a divine or preternatural judgment."

ORDALÍA: "Prueba ritual usada en la Europa medieval y en ciertas sociedades para averiguar la culpabilidad o inocencia de una persona acusada y una de cuyas formas es el juicio de Dios." 

Both definitions are similar, but English dictionaries give an additional one: "any extremely severe or trying test, experience, or trial." For this additional meaning, we must use the Spanish "calvario", (padecimiento muy intenso y prolongado)  instead of "ordeal" because the Spanish "ordalía" is mostly unknown and unused, although the same. For example: "Living with you has been an ordeal." "Vivir contigo ha sido un calvario." 

PHRASE SLEUTH

 

Just as there are word detectives (Cf. John Simpson´s The Word Detective), I have become a Bilingual Phrase Sleuth. I track, trace, and nail down equivalent phrases in English and Spanish. Traits to become a lexicographic bilingual phrase sleuth are stubbornness, hard work, constant alertness, reading, time, and carloads of patience. Pay no heed to those who praise the wonders of the internet and databanks sky high. We still have a long way to go in bilingual lexicography. While we wait for the Internet and Google to become linguistically serious, let me tell you an English idiom: Get up on one´s hind legs,  become assertive, aggressive, belligerent, etc., according to Webster´s New World Dictionary, 2nd Ed.  "McBride then got up on his hind legs and told them he and his mates would kiss what girls they wanted to." (Louis A. Mayer, Under the Jolly Roger, 2007.) "David finally got up on his hind legs and told the boss what he thought of him."

The phrase sleuth has to be on the look-out at all times and sniff the language winds for possible equivalents, such as Echar las patas por alto, defined by María Moliner as "Dar rienda suelta al enfado que se siente, gritando o en cualquier otra format violenta." El Mundo (15/01/1995.) we may read: "Y than decidido echar las patas por alto y crear un caos..."

Echar las patas por alto = Get up on one´s hind legs. And the mystery is solved.