Read Online French Toast by Harriet Welty Rochefort - Free Book Online
Authors: Harriet Welty Rochefort
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stuff funny. Yes, I was prim indeed.
As a child growing up in the great American Midwest, I learned right off the bat that there were three subjects one did not broach at the dinner table: sex, religion, and politics. Perhaps years of skirting the taboo trio gave me a much better sense of humor about much of what I hear at French dinner tables, where conversations are often
based
on one or more of the three forbidden fruits.
An example: There was a lively conversation in which, amid much laughter, we admired two newborn baby boysâtheir little hands and pretty skin and eyes, right down to their penises, where a very factual allusion was made in passing to the respective sizes. Up until that point, I had been translating much of the lighthearted banter for my brother-in-law, who was visiting from Chicago. But somehow, my midwestern upbringing got in the way of a truthful rendering of the penis comparison. I knew that he, a fellow midwesterner, would have been as embarrassed as I was. Something would definitely have been lost in translation.
Since they are not puritanical, the French talk aboutsex very openly. This does not mean that they are a nation of sex fiends; it just means that there is no stigma attached to the discussion of sex in mixed company (or in general). Of course, that depends on whoâs discussing it and how. A reality check here: Most French people donât sit around talking about sex. They also talk about philosophy, politics, money (not all that much), food, and wine (a lot).
In France, sexual innuendos abound in conversations. These sexual references, many of which are puns or word associations, are much more frequent than dirty jokes. Locker room conversations, I am told, are looked down on. I mean, who needs to âtalk dirtyâ when itâs all out in the open? (On this score, if I may add an editorial comment, I think the French are saner than the Anglo-Saxons.)
âWeâre not puritanical and hence weâre less hypocritical about sex than the Americans are,â remarked one Frenchwoman with a certain pride.
You can say that again.
To see how really unpuritanical the French are, you just have to look at their ads. Of course everyone sells consumer goods by using sex, but the French excel at it. French publicist Jacques Séguéla calls American publicity âefficient and aggressiveâ . . . to the saturation point. In contrast, he says that French advertising is âinstinctive, passionate, sentimental, romantic, in brief, warm.â
Sometimes the ads are just âwarm,â as he says. Sometimes theyâre hot.
One of the best-known and -remembered ones was a TV ad for Perrier. In it, the famous little green bottle is stroked by the expert red-nailed fingers of a woman who does not appear on-screen. The bottle, which starts out at 8 ounces, grows to 12 ounces under the expert palpatation. Then it grows and grows even more, until at one liter, it literally explodes its liquid into the air. âThis spot,â concluded one French magazine, âwas like the butter scene in
Last Tango in Paris
.â
Well, we certainly didnât see anything like
that
when I was growing up in Iowa. And we certainly didnât see what I saw one day while thumbing through the photo album of a very close French friend, one of the most conventionally bourgeois people you would ever hope to run across. There sat my girlfriend, barebreasted, on a beach, with her two little girls at her side. I wasnât surprised that she had been barebreasted on the beach. What surprised me was that she had included the photo in the family album, which everyone would look at, including her own mother! My immediate reaction to the photos was proof to me that my midwestern primness has not entirely deserted me.
By the same token, I used to be shocked by a lot of the conversations going on around me. But I now see that rather than turning my children into sex maniacs, the
As a child growing up in the great American Midwest, I learned right off the bat that there were three subjects one did not broach at the dinner table: sex, religion, and politics. Perhaps years of skirting the taboo trio gave me a much better sense of humor about much of what I hear at French dinner tables, where conversations are often
based
on one or more of the three forbidden fruits.
An example: There was a lively conversation in which, amid much laughter, we admired two newborn baby boysâtheir little hands and pretty skin and eyes, right down to their penises, where a very factual allusion was made in passing to the respective sizes. Up until that point, I had been translating much of the lighthearted banter for my brother-in-law, who was visiting from Chicago. But somehow, my midwestern upbringing got in the way of a truthful rendering of the penis comparison. I knew that he, a fellow midwesterner, would have been as embarrassed as I was. Something would definitely have been lost in translation.
Since they are not puritanical, the French talk aboutsex very openly. This does not mean that they are a nation of sex fiends; it just means that there is no stigma attached to the discussion of sex in mixed company (or in general). Of course, that depends on whoâs discussing it and how. A reality check here: Most French people donât sit around talking about sex. They also talk about philosophy, politics, money (not all that much), food, and wine (a lot).
In France, sexual innuendos abound in conversations. These sexual references, many of which are puns or word associations, are much more frequent than dirty jokes. Locker room conversations, I am told, are looked down on. I mean, who needs to âtalk dirtyâ when itâs all out in the open? (On this score, if I may add an editorial comment, I think the French are saner than the Anglo-Saxons.)
âWeâre not puritanical and hence weâre less hypocritical about sex than the Americans are,â remarked one Frenchwoman with a certain pride.
You can say that again.
To see how really unpuritanical the French are, you just have to look at their ads. Of course everyone sells consumer goods by using sex, but the French excel at it. French publicist Jacques Séguéla calls American publicity âefficient and aggressiveâ . . . to the saturation point. In contrast, he says that French advertising is âinstinctive, passionate, sentimental, romantic, in brief, warm.â
Sometimes the ads are just âwarm,â as he says. Sometimes theyâre hot.
One of the best-known and -remembered ones was a TV ad for Perrier. In it, the famous little green bottle is stroked by the expert red-nailed fingers of a woman who does not appear on-screen. The bottle, which starts out at 8 ounces, grows to 12 ounces under the expert palpatation. Then it grows and grows even more, until at one liter, it literally explodes its liquid into the air. âThis spot,â concluded one French magazine, âwas like the butter scene in
Last Tango in Paris
.â
Well, we certainly didnât see anything like
that
when I was growing up in Iowa. And we certainly didnât see what I saw one day while thumbing through the photo album of a very close French friend, one of the most conventionally bourgeois people you would ever hope to run across. There sat my girlfriend, barebreasted, on a beach, with her two little girls at her side. I wasnât surprised that she had been barebreasted on the beach. What surprised me was that she had included the photo in the family album, which everyone would look at, including her own mother! My immediate reaction to the photos was proof to me that my midwestern primness has not entirely deserted me.
By the same token, I used to be shocked by a lot of the conversations going on around me. But I now see that rather than turning my children into sex maniacs, the
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