Lara Barnett Feb 25, 2012:

French endearments But would the complete English readership understand the French endearments?

L.J.Wessel van Leeuwen (asker) Feb 25, 2012:

Lara it is from prose with poem text in it. Modern. The person saying it is the author himself (preumably to himself, ha,ha).
Basically I wanted to know whether one should just keep the endearment without translating these or use endearments in English; in which case of course being a grey-haired male of 72, I could conjure more than a dozen. no-one has suggested to keep the french endearments.

Lara Barnett Feb 24, 2012:

Context Could you clarify whether this is from a novel, poem or play etc? And also, what is the person saying it? An older person, or a younger person etc. and what time period this is in. There could be so many expressions possible here but knowing the register and character of the voice of the speaker could help define which.

Jocelyne Cuenin Feb 24, 2012:

? Thought French fancy was another name for petit four.

L.J.Wessel van Leeuwen (asker) Feb 24, 2012:

Such as?

Jocelyne Cuenin Feb 24, 2012:

Instead of petit four, and since we've got chou de Chine, we could be bold and try French fancy?