Enjoy Life

Last week I used the phrase joie de vivre, a French phrase that when translated literally means joy of living. Its meaning is given as a delight in being alive or a carefree enjoyment of living. Its first recorded use in English was in 1889. It is descriptive of a character trait rather than an emotion.

There is no word in English that is a synonym, so to describe someone with a joy of living or a love of life requires three words in English or in French. Ebullient comes closest, but it refers more to a transient state than a character trait.

Etymonline.com gives a couple of other French phrases along with its succinct etymology of joie de vivre: savoir-faire and feu de joie.

I have not encountered feu de joie, but then I have not been to a lot of military ceremonies. A feu de joie is a volley of gunfire beginning at one end of a line of soldiers, going down the line and returning back down the line to the first soldier. The best audio/visual example I could find was here; you can hear the sound of it, even if you can't see the shooting. I found examples of this impressive ceremony on YouTube from around the world. According to some accounts it was a sunset ceremony as a fort's gates were closed and the soldiers retreated into the security of the fort.

Savoir-faire is a far different phrase. According to etymonline.com it is "instinctive knowledge of the right course of action in any circumstance," and came into use in English in 1815. A literal translation is "to know [how] to do." Savoir means "to know" and comes from the Latin word sapere from which we get sapient. Faire comes from the Latin word facere that means to make or do and from which we get our word factitious.

I used the word transient above. It has several meaning in common use. Perhaps the most common use is as a noun, to describe a person or thing that is temporary. But is is often used in the U.S. of a homeless person and is somewhat akin to a hobo (next week's post). But its original meaning, still in use today, is of anything not durable or that is about to pass away or pass on. Transient comes from the Latin word transientem. Transient has meant "passing through without staying" since the 1680s; while the noun has existed since the 1650s its use to describe a guest or boarder has only been used since 1857.

What is the difference between transient and transitory? While the words by definition seem to be synonyms, transitory has a sense of passing away while transient more of passing on. Transitory has been used in English even longer than transient. It arrived in the 1400s from the Old French word transitoire that came from the Late Latin word transitorius that in classical Latin meant "allowing passage through." The best synonym for transitory is ephemeral (also next week's post), not transient.

In other words, something that ceases to exist is transitory. Something that continues to exist after briefly being present is transient. A circus or carnival is transient; the excitement from their presence is transitory.

But for someone with joie de vivre both are thoroughly enjoyed.