Communicating in Two Languages

We lived in Papineauville for 4 years. There was almost no English spoken in that small rural village in Québec. Diane and I assumed that our young daughters could not understand English and, when we did not want them to understand what we were discussing, we spoke to each other in English. What we did not know was that Geneviève, our little sponge, had picked up enough English by occasionally watching Sesame Street on TV to understand what we were saying!

I also learned a smattering of English as a child by watching TV shows. It was not, however, until I was in grade 9 that I started to systematically learn how to read and write in English. Even though we resided in Quebec, my parents had the foresight to send me to a high school in Ottawa where half the subjects were taught in English and half in French. I remember my first English literature course. One of the books we were to read was Macbeth. I sometimes jokingly say that, for a few months, I believed that the correct written form of addressing others was “Thee’ and “Thou”.

I have since then mastered both languages and like to use both to communicate. I say “like”, but I should in fact say, “need to”. Both languages have become part of me and allow me to say who I am. They are not, however, always interchangeable, especially when I speak about deeply personal things. If you were invited to one of our family gatherings you would hear a lot of French being spoken. If you didn't, you would either be in the wrong house or you should start suspecting that aliens have taken over our bodies. 

When someone asks me to translate what I have written in French, I am happy to oblige if I can. I must also admit that I feel a slight pinch of sadness as well when they do because I know that the English version would never be able to transmit all the depth of meaning and lived experience that the French version contains. The same holds true when I write in English about something that comes from my heart. The beautiful language of Shakespeare conveys supple nuances of meaning that are lost even in the best of translations.

If I write in both English and French it is not simply because I want to reach people who can read only one of these languages. It is also because I cannot otherwise express fully the different layers of who I am. Learning another language adds a new layer to who you are.