Language  |
Beauty & a key
to knowledge |
-
- Wikipedia article
text
text
text
text
Pronunciation of a famous name
Camille Saint-Saëns  |
Photo by Pierre Petit
(Public domain) |
For a good long time I really did not know how to pronounce this famous composer's name. I have heard two different pronunciations from people who ought to be reliable and have only recently got to the bottom of the mystery.
French spelling is about as difficult as English spelling and is not really a good guide to pronunciation. A lot of English speakers seem to apply a rule of thumb that you do not pronounce the ends of French words, but this is not particularly useful, and so they end up using ridiculous pronunciations. The "rule" is impossible to apply consistently, especially when it comes to monosyllables. For example, the words bac, lac, sac, coq, dot and est (meaning east) are pronounced in full. The names of the towns of Lens and Sens have a clear s at the end and so does that of the town of Saint-Saëns in Normandy. However, this has not always been so and the composer Saint-Saëns spoke his own name without the s. A detailed explanation is given in a note in the Wikipedia article about him and I give the text of that note below.
Although French-speaking musicians and intellectuals often still use the traditional pronunciation without s at the end ([sɛ̃sɑ̃]), the pronunciation with s is now very common in French, even among radio announcers. Saint-Saëns himself wanted his name to be pronounced like that of the town Saint-Saëns, which was pronounced without s at the end until about 1940-1950 in accordance with the spelling without s that was in use until about 1840-1860, as explained by Claude Fournier in his history of the town.[1] The diaeresis on the e dates from a time when the e was not silent, but the diaeresis no longer affects the pronunciation of the name(s) because the e is silent, as in the name Madame de Staël, for example.
Incidentally, there is a little place just to the south of Caen in Normandy called Ifs, pronounced [if], without the s, known to me only because it is the birthplace of the operatic soprano Sabine Devieilhe.[2]
Notes - See this article (in French)
- Exactly how this is pronounced I am not too sure. I have heard one French person say it and I think I heard [sa.bin də.vjɛl]. I had wondered whether it was a non-standard spelling for -eille, but perhaps I think too much!
UPDATE: I have now found a video of her pronouncing her own name and it is indeed [sa.bin də.vjɛl]. See this clip. The name comes right at the start. So I do think too much! 3/18
Saint-Saëns in Normandy  |
A view of the town
(Photo: actu.fr) |
Uploading ....
