A Cat in the Throat?: A Lighthearted Study of the Contrasting Uses of Metaphor in French and English Idioms

This playful discussion of English and French idioms seeks to examine some of the odd and curious ways that each language expresses its everyday emotions, situations, and events. At times, the two languages are perfectly in agreement regarding the best descriptive metaphor. But as often as not, they vary wildly, and the differences are frequently interesting, and often quite amusing. Where it was useful, we provide a brief history of the expressions, and show how their meanings have changed through the lifetimes of the idioms. As we note in the Preface, one hope for our study was to discover some clues as to what makes French French and English English!