Re: I'm new!

Christophe Grandsire wrote:
>
> En réponse à Irina Rempt <ira@...>:
>
> > On Sat, 21 Oct 2000, Yoon Ha Lee wrote:
> >
> > > In German and French, "novel" seems to be "roman," but I *think*
> > German
> > > for short story is "Geschichte" and French for short story is
> > "histoire"
> > > (both of with, IIRC, also mean "history").
> >
>
> No, "histoire" means simply 'story' as well as 'history', and thus can be used
> for any kind of story, but the real translation of 'short story' is "nouvelle".
>
> > In Dutch, "novel" is "roman" and "short story" is "kort verhaal"
> > (meaning "short story"). We do have "novelle" but it means "novella",
> > that is, a book with a story that's too long for a short story but
> > not as long as a full-length novel.
> >
>
> Funny, we don't have this distinction in French. We usually say: "une longue
> nouvelle", or "un roman court" (the last one seems to be more often used than
> the first one).
Note the word order in "longue nouvelle", which makes it look like an
idiom rather than a simple transparent phrase "long short story" (yes,
we do say that in English sometimes no matter how stupid it sounds).

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