“Please RSVP” Sounds Fancy …
But it’s just redundant
Published in
1 min readJun 21, 2014
The ubiquitous invitation acronym RSVP is short for répondez s’il vous plaît, which means “please respond” in French. So please don’t say “Please RSVP” unless you mean to beg: Please, please respond!
Interestingly, this acronym has passed out of favor in France, where it’s considered too formal and old-fashioned. Instead, the French say réponse souhaitée and then their preferred date and/or method of response.
A Point of Etiquette
- RSVP — Respond whether your answer is yes or no
- RSVP regrets only — Only respond if you will not attend; not responding is taken as a yes.
If you found this lesson helpful, please ♥ below. Merci !
Originally published at www.lawlessfrench.com on June 21, 2014.
