"Elle n'est pas aussi jeune qu'elle en a l'air."
Translation:She is not as young as she looks.
19 Comments
In Spanish, avoir l'air de (tener aire de) is an expression used to say someone has a certain presence surrounding (air) him/her (Sort of like a "vibe"). Could it be the same expression or is avoir l'air de in French restricted to having a facial expression of some sort?
it sounds like she's saying guere instead of l'air. Does anyone else here a G there?
"En" is a pronoun, acting as a replacement of "jeune": elle n'est pas aussi jeune qu'elle a l'air - jeune-
Why "en"? I thought that it only replaced objects preceeded by the preposition "de".
"elle a l'air" needs a complement with preposition "de". In this case, "en" is the complement, replacing "d'être jeune":
- elle n'est pas aussi jeune qu'elle [en] a l'air [d'être jeune]
in between "pas" and "aussi" - Do I need to make the "s" sound? a liaison is needed there?
871
Has anyone tried to use the pleonastic "ne" here, i.e., "elle n'est pas aussi jeune qu'elle n'en a l'air." Maybe it's old-fashioned, but I think it's still correct, and I hate it when things are marked as incorrect when they aren't. If it's truly incorrect, I'd like to know why.
Sitesurf, a very long time ago Americans would use phrases like, "She had an air of sophistication about her." Do you happen to know if French was the origin of such manners of speech?
Yes, it apparently was, after Greek and Latin. Please take a look at "air n.2": https://www.etymonline.com/word/air
