Found a book to read

I finally came across the perfect French book for my mood--I'd forgotten I'd bought it on my last day of work. It's called Un petit pas pour l'homme (One Small Step For Man.)

A couple years ago I read Morlante, a book about a psychopath pirate who just wants to be left alone to write novels. It was so funny, it's the only book I wish I hadn't given away because with my practicing-French-mode I might have actually re-read it.

This is another Dompierre book, about a guy who dumps his girlfriend, and then realizes his new single life isn't as glamorous as he anticipated. The line I like best in the description is: "At 20, there was nothing cooler than being the manager of a record shop. At 30, it's another thing."

I only read the first chapter on the bus, but it was très funny, dans le style Nick Hornby, who I enjoy.

By the way, when I write titles here in French, I get mixed up about what to capitalize. I'd always remembered the rule as being: You only capitalize the first word, unless the first word is a word like an article or whatever (the, and, a) in which case you also capitalize the next word.

But a lot of the time when I see titles written on the internet they still only capitalize the first word no matter what it is. But you can't trust what you see written here and there, because frankly people just don't know their own grammar. I remember in grade 9 I was saying something apologetic about my French, to my French teacher, and she said (in mild disgust--she was Very Proper) that it was better than many of my fellow Francophone students. (I didn't have the worst grades, and French wasn't my worst subject.)

Anyway, I looked up the rule just now, and it's worse than I thought:

If the title is a definite article followed by a noun = article lower case, noun upper case (unless I guess it's the beginning of a sentence.) The Cat by Shakespeare.

Noun followed by adjective = only the noun is capitalized. The Cat fat by Shakespeare.  <--okay imagine this is all in French where adjectives often come after nouns.

So far we're okay, it follows the rule I was taught. Here's what's new to me:

An adjective followed by a noun, well now they're both capitalized!  The Fat Cat by Shakespeare.

Two nouns tied together by "or" = both capitalized. The Cat or the Mat by Shakespeare.

And apparently all other cases, only the first word is capitalized: Un, on, et...  So the rule I learned only applies in the case of "the", so I must have remembered it wrong. And if it's in the middle of a sentence, you wouldn't capitalize the. So the Fat Cat by Shakespeare is written like that. But the Cat fat by Shakespeare like that, and the Cat or the Mat by Shakespeare is like that. But One cat who went to market by Shakespeare is written like that.

• Pour les titres d’œuvres, voici quelques règles¹ :
  • Le titre est un article défini suivi d’un nom : l'article s'écrit avec une minuscule, le nom avec une majuscule. Avez-vous lu la Chute de Camus ?
  • Le titre est un nom suivi d'un adjectif : seul le nom prend la majuscule. Non, mais je vais lire la Machine infernale.
  • Le titre est constitué par deux noms coordonnés par ou : les deux noms prennent la majuscule. Jorge Semprun a publié l’Écriture ou la Vie en 1994.
  • Le titre se compose d'un adjectif suivi d'un nom : tous deux prennent la majuscule. René Barjavel a publié le Grand Secret en 1973.
  • Dans les autres cas, seul le premier mot prend la majuscule. On remet toujours à plus tard la lecture d’À la recherche du temps perdu.

This week I'm going to get my hands on some grammar books and start reviewing all this. :-)