Missatges: 15
Llengua: English
david_uk (Mostra el perfil) 16 de febrer de 2017 15.47.34
This is something in "Step by step in esperanto", but I can only translate it as "We talk between four eyes", and that makes no sense at all.
nornen (Mostra el perfil) 16 de febrer de 2017 16.19.40
david_uk (Mostra el perfil) 16 de febrer de 2017 17.04.00
Can you explain why? Is that a common phrase in some other language?
I have never heard anyone say that in English.
david_uk (Mostra el perfil) 16 de febrer de 2017 17.37.48
http://ell.stackexchange.com/questions/117356/is-t...
Apparently this is a German idiom. What it is doing in a book that is supposed to teach Esperanto to English speakers I have no idea.
opajpoaj (Mostra el perfil) 16 de febrer de 2017 21.18.06
https://fr.wiktionary.org/wiki/entre_quatre-z-yeux
&
http://bdl.oqlf.gouv.qc.ca/bdl/gabarit_bdl.asp?id=...
bartlett22183 (Mostra el perfil) 16 de febrer de 2017 21.40.13
Roch (Mostra el perfil) 16 de febrer de 2017 22.13.32
![demando.gif](/images/smileys/demando.gif)
Gestandnis unter vier Augen (released in other English-speaking countries as "Confession Under Four Eyes"), the 1954 Andre Michel West German romantic crime melodrama starring Hildegard Knef, Carl Raddatz, Ivan Desny, Werner Hinz, Franz Schafheitlin, and Stanislav Ledinek
![externalImage.png](/assets/f5b04b4f/images/layout/externalImage.png)
edit
Oh I see through opajpoaj's link that it already existed by 1921
Vestitor (Mostra el perfil) 16 de febrer de 2017 22.20.04
I agree with Bartlett. Speaking in idioms (or inventing them) in Esperanto is a disaster waiting to happen. There is no way you can be sure that another person from a different culture will recognise an idiom's structure and meaning.
And let's face the fact, it's not as if the world is teeming with virtuoso Esperantists waiting to decipher them.
noelekim (Mostra el perfil) 17 de febrer de 2017 2.26.30
raydpratt (Mostra el perfil) 19 de febrer de 2017 17.01.49