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  1. M’aiderez-vous à trouver un moyen de le faire ? {Will you help me?}

  2. M’aideriez-vous à trouver un moyen de le faire ? {Would you help me?}

  3. Aidez-moi à trouver un moyen de le faire ? {Please help me.}

  4. Veuillez m’aider à trouver un moyen de le faire ? {Would you please help me?}

I wonder how these four expressions rank in terms of politeness levels. I mean, from the least polite to the most polite.

Do my English translations correctly reflect the different levels of politeness suggested in the French sentences?

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pourrait Peut-être
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1 Answers1

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  • 4) "veuillez m'aider" is an imperative, like (3) but with a pedantic tone, so it is not polite at all.
  • 3) "aidez-moi" is an imperative without the pedantic tone, equivalent to "help me.". It's not particularly polite.
  • 1) "m'aiderez-vous" is equivalent to "will you help me?".
  • 2) "m'aideriez-vous" is equivalent to "would you help me?".

The equivalent to "please, help me" is "s'il vous plait, aidez-moi." It is quite the same level of politeness as (2) but is more used in spoken language, whereas (2) and (1) are rarely found outside written French and sound more literary.

Anne Aunyme
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