"I briefly read the newspaper."
Translation:Je lis rapidement le journal.
63 Comments
First, there is definitely a French / English disconnect here. Briefly and rapidly (in English) do NOT mean remotely the same thing, as someone pointed out. Secondly, we not even heard of these these tenses at all, and I'm at level 11 - J'ai lu / Je lisais. This question does not belong here.
Jan2015: This sentence was fixed to not include "briefly" in the correct answers.
In addition, at this stage, "read" has to be considered as simple present, since past tenses have not been taught yet.
However, if "I read" is simple past, the best translation in French is "J'ai lu" (past action, complete).
Secondarily, if "I read" is considered as the expression of a repeated action or a habit in the past, it can be translated to the French imparfait: "Je lisais".
I briefly read the newspaper, means to me I read the newspaper for very little time. Je lis rapidement le journal, sounds to me like, I rapidly read the newspaper, and that means to me I read the whole newspaper, every word, very quickly. Now since, rapidement, means both rapidly and briefly, how do you differentiate those two, at least in this sentence?
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The question is how do the French use this word. Larousse defines rapidement two ways: 1) quickly, rapidly (in terms of speed), and 2) briefly (meaning superficially). We try to explain this sentence as a speed-reading contest because from a speed perspective, that is all that makes sense. But it appears the French also use the same word (rapidement) to make a superficial pass. In the context of reading, we would say that we glance at the headlines or scan the pages, flipping through them rapidly. There is nothing that implies the reader is reading every single word. It isn't the only time we will see a single word in any language which is used in rather different ways. We might as well get used to the idea. http://www.larousse.com/en/dictionaries/french-english/rapidement/65745
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Excellent comment, I gave you a lingot. That is always my question, how do the French actually use the words. Appreciate you sir.
See the conversation started by the pixie. Unfortunately this is an artifact of the way Duolingo works. If the past tense is accepted or not accepted, either way it's unfair to someone! Many users will have learnt some French already and will get confused if the past tense is not accepted.
The issue is that these sentences with the past tense are being presented as multiple choice options - we must select them as correct translations or we lose a heart. That isn't fair for those of us who haven't yet learnt the past tense. The solution is simple: don't present the past tense as options in the multiple choice (they can still be accepted in other versions of the question).
I agree that would be a great solution if it actually is a simple solution! I wouldn't know, but I assumed it would be too hard for Duo to do, or they would have already done it...
As someone who knows computer programming, it's only difficult if they programmed themselves into a corner. If they set up their structures and data correctly, this would be a relatively easy bug to fix.
That being said, I have no idea how they set up their program.
Well, I was presented with multiple choice and another option was "J'ai lu rapidement le journal." As the English "read" can be both present and past tense, it was correct; but not having learnt about the French past tense yet, I did not recognize it and lost a heart.
The choices (besides an obviously wrong one) that I was presented with were "J'ai lu rapidement le journal" and "Je lisais rapidement le journal." So given that neither is present tense, and present tense is the only thing I've learned so far, there's definitely something wrong in the system.
Same here - I picked je lisais but never would have picked j'ai lu. I don't mind getting it wrong, but ...
And I've just been given 'je lisais' as the correct option when tenses other than the present aren't accepted. I've flagged it.
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why not "j'ai lu brièvement le journal"? ("read" is ambiguous in English, and could be present or past tense)
I guess because this is being presented (at least to me) at level 8 (9?) and we haven't done the past tense yet. So, while I would agree with you, we're not supposed to know how to do that yet!
Except now it shows up in the multiple choice an I lose a heart, since I've never encountered "lu" or anything in the past tense :/
Why is "Je lis le journal à un bref instant" wrong, seeing as that is how duolingo translated "briefly"? Rapidement means quickly to me, which does not mean the same is briefly, as far as I know
It really doesn't matter what the words mean to us (if we're not French), it's what the words mean to the French speaker, because we're learning French.
The meaning matters to me because I want to be accurate in what I say.
Pourquoi ne peut-on pas dire "J'ai brièvement lu le journal." J'ai appris qu'il faut mettre les adverbes après le verbe auxiliaire. Je sais que si l'adverbe est assez long on peut le mettre après, mais ce que j'ai mis n'est pas correct?
It gave me "j'ai lu rapidement le journal"...I have not learned what "lu" is yet. Weird...
Because "lisais" is the first person singular imperfect past (imparfait) form of the verb "lire".
only two minute before "je lis rapidement le journal" was an option of answer, but now it has disapeared and no exist that answer, but yet there is a sentence in other place that translate "je lis rapidement le journal" as "i briefly read the newspaper". the polemic go on
I think that "Je lisais rapidement le journal" shouldn't be accepted since it means "I was briefly reading the newspaper" and not "I briefly read the newspaper".
"vitement" does not exist. The adverb is "vite" and there is no adjective of the same family.
It sounded right to me, too, until I realised I was thinking of "vêtement" (a piece of clothing)...
I believe so (see http://www.wordreference.com/fren/survoler). And on that basis I would have thought it would bemore appropriate than "rapidement"? I thought "rapidement" meant "quickly" - and that isn't exactly what "briefly" means. My interpretation of "briefly" is superficially, or for a short period of time. Anyone care to confirm that for me?
Yes, as I reported, '"briefly" means for a short period, not necessarily rapidly'
the adverb has to be placed after "lis".
if the verb was in 2 words (like passé composé) you would put it between the auxiliary and the participle: "j'ai brièvement lu le journal".
I put 'j'ai lis' because I thought 'read' (sounding like 'red') was in the past tense, but the correction was 'je lis', the present tense. It could be either, therefore I think the past tense should also be accepted.
The past tense would have been "j'ai lu", so that's why your answer was incorrect.
I didn't realise that 'rapidement' could mean 'briefly' so had to use G Translate for vocab here.
i've looked this up in french wiktionary and apparently "bref" is both an adj and an adv. so both "brief" and "briefly". unsurprisingly, duo wouldn't accept it. could someone confirm if this is correct?
the third choice is past tense. If we are doing present tense then the option is incorrect
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Sitesurf, is it necessarily "Wrong" to start the sentence with 'je', and use the adverb after je? I did it as DUO required, but only on the second trip through. The first time I did the lesson I was graded "wrong" for using the word order: 'Je brievement lis le journal'. Just interested. Thanks.
When the verb is simple (one word), you have to place the adverb after the verb (like French adjectives generally come after the noun): "je lis brièvement le journal".
When the verb is in a compound tense (auxiliary + past participle), you can place the adverb between the two parts of the verb: "j'ai brièvement lu le journal", or after: "j'ai lu brièvement le journal".
C'est vrai mais la différence est mince quand il s'agit du journal. Que vous le lisiez rapidement ou brièvement, il s'agit d'une lecture incomplète dans un temps limité.
I wrote Je bereavement lis le journal. i don't know where to place the adjective in the sentence. any rules to help me by?
"J'ai lu brievement le journal" n'est pas le meme comme "J'ai lu rapidement le journal" et pourquoi pas ?
I don't know that Duo has the programming to know that the person getting this question hasn't been introduced to the passé compose, and people do go back an refresh/review lessons. I agree it would be nice if it could determine that (so that it wouldn't offer unfamiliar things in multiple choice questions), but fortunately most English verbs aren't like "read".
"je lisais" is imperfect, back translating to "I was reading" (continuous past) or "I used to read" (habit/repeated action) or "I would read" (habit/repeated action).
