Reply SIL Vous Plait

[SciFiRocker]

RSVP = Reply SIL Vous Plait...
Which is French for please.

RSVP means reply please.

Aibu that you DO NOT IGNORE A PARTY INVITATION!

(Rant over)

S'il vous plait just means Please.

A bit like Au revoir means Goodbye. (Not literally, until to see again)

People who take it literally and don't bother responding are arseholes, just respond yes or no, it's not difficult.

I think something a little more blunt than RSVP is called for these days, so I think CuriousaboutSamphire's suggestion is perfect.

if (si) it (il) you (vous) pleases (plâit)

Even translated literally, it's "if it pleases you", because the "vous" is a direct object pronoun relating to the verb "plaire". The conjugated verb is plaît, not plâit.

OP It's répondez s'il vous plaît.

I was surprised at the thread by a very nice sounding lady who didn't think she needed to reply to an invite if they weren't going.

Yup my daughter's party was last month. I think by the end about 50/60% had bothered to reply. It's so rude and I don't really know why people do it- it takes seconds to send a text.

You often see 'please RSVP' which seems appropriately desperate in the case of children's parties.

French here, s'il vous plaît can be litterally translated as "if it pleases you" but I only ever use it as "please".

If I wanted to say "answer if you wish" or "answer if you feel like it" I would not use "s'il vous plaît" I would just write " Répondez si vous le souhaitez"

People shouldn't ignore invitations no but then again French people aren't known to be the most polite unfortunately. Maybe reach out to everyone by text (it's a pain in the arse but much more likely that you will get an answer in minutes instead of the old fashion way!)

Set up a whatsapp group for all invitees.

Send a (ranty) message to all, saying " if you haven't confirmed your attendance at the party by Monday I'm afraid you will be considered to be not attending. Hope you understand as we need numbers for caterers etc. Thanks all."

Set up a whatsapp group for all invitees

how do you get their phone number though? I only got parents details from their own invite, or their replies to mine. At best people join our parents facebook group, but that's it.

I'm pretty sure when a French person says "s'il vous plait" they don't mean only IF you WANT to
This.
And I am French.
"S'il vous plait" has the same meaning as "please": a polite way of asking for something, regardless of it it pleases the recipient or not.

cucaracha,

Everyone in my child's group will have a mobile number that I can contact, otherwise they will not be in the group.

I know what you mean though, but still.

boxthefox sorry but I am not sure what you do mean

How do you get the mobile numbers? Does the school give a list, or does the class rep gather them?

YANBU. If it has RSVP on it, you reply.

If you don't reply , you are rude. End of.

Breaking down "s'il vous plais" into its individual components to try and get the meaning doesn't work though. As others have pointed out, used all together it means "please", and that's how it's used. No one goes into a French cafe and asks for "a coffee if it pleases you"! RSVP means reply please. And people blooming should!

I remember many many years 35 ago my Mum being very frustrated by IL's family not replying to wedding invites... Grandma who lived next door to future SIL, mentioned no one had replied despite being asked to on the invite..

SIL fetched invite to prove there was no....please reply... Gran had to explain RSVP

if you please

Given that pretty much every other European language uses a verb meaning "be pleasing to" where English uses the syntactically opposite "like", you won't be astonished to learn that "if you please" is probably a relic from when English used far more subjunctives and case marking. See also "please God" which isn't "[oh pretty] please[,] God" but "[may it] please God".

RSVP may stand for "répondez s'il vous plaît" which is the equivalent of "please reply" ... but in English it is a fully integrated loan and can be a noun or verb in its initialism form pronounced entirely English-ly. Forget what the French means: it isn't French any more if it turns up on an English-language invitation. And although it would previously have indicated that the invitation needed a reply (as opposed to the kind of invitation which is a ticket you can redeem or not as you feel on the day) its meaning is alas changing.

So if you want people to respond either way, say so in plain English (or, that is, the language of the rest of the invitation). Some still won't, but that's a question of manners/consideration rather than linguistics.

Good post MrsHathaway.

As in, "Have you RSVPed to the Bloggs' invitation"

I'm quite staggered that a lot of people don't know what RSVP means. I suppose it's partly due to letter writing more or less dying out. Are children even taught how to write in a formal letter format anymore? Everyone seems to understand LOL, BRB, CUL8R but not a good old fashioned RSVP.

That said, I've a feeling that some wont reply whatever bloody language you use.

The French expression Bon apres midi doesn't translate well either but at least is logical but not what would be said in English, good after midday.
A French colleague years ago used to come up with some cracking English words which were correct but needed a dictionary to check their meaning as they were not in common usage.
However I digress JUST REPLY !

The French expression Bon apres midi doesn't translate well either but at least is logical but not what would be said in English, good after midday.
Literally (as well as translated as it would be said in English), it's good afternoon. midi = noon
www.wordreference.com/enfr/noon
The difference is that in French, bon(ne) après-midi is a greeting used to say goodbye (in the afternoon).

The most accurate literal translation which is also grammatically correct in English is "if it pleases you". In this construction, "vous" is the subject of the sentence, not the object.

Ignore that. Wrong way round. And I didn't see the third page.

cough

Other way round.

Cross posted.