french: descriptive adjectives?!!???

Question

i have a section of homework in the workbook where i am supposed to place descriptive adjectives within a sentence. however, the corresponding book does not address where to place them!!!

here is an example sentence:
Voici LA MAISON de mes grands-parents. (nouveau, joli)

the words in capital letters are the words that we want to describe more and the words in the parenthesis are the ones we want to use to describe.

so, i read some descriptive sentences randomly in the book and i am thinking that you just throw in the descriptive words right after the capital lettered words?

am i missing something? or is this actually that simple?

well how do i know when to place the adjectives before/after the noun?

and what if i need to use 2 adjectives at once? like with the first example?

Answer 1

I wonder what book you have that do not explain the rules that you’re supposed to follow to complete the homework…

Please, do not just throw in the descriptive words right after the capital lettered word!

I am so sorry to let you know that if you think you’re missing something…you’re right and it is not that simple.
It’s not even simple for French people. They observe the rules without even thinking about them because French is their native language but most of them could not explain those rules to you unless there’s teachers of the French language.

Before I start (if I haven’t already done so, lol), let me point out that “maison” is a feminine word, so in your sentence, the adjectives associated with it would be “nouvelle” and “jolie” which are the feminine forms of “nouveau” and “joli” (Peaco1000, pay attention…). I’m pretty sure it’s a little trick just for your teacher to make sure you know the proper gender of the word “maison”.

“Nouveau” is in fact a pretty tricky adjective. First, it’s an irregular one, nouveau/nouvelle (new), like beau/belle (beautiful) or vieux/vieille (old).
Second, it changes if it is placed before of after a word: une nouvelle maison, une maison neuve, un nouveau chapeau, un chapeau neuf.
And third, nouveau is like beau or vieux and the forms “nouvel”, “bel” and “vieil” are used before a masculine singular noun beginning with a vowel or silent h (un bel oiseau, un nouvel arbre, un vieil hotel).
All this sounds a little complicated but it’s not if you think of the sounds. The word oiseau is masculine but “un beau oiseau” would just sounds wrong because you cannot make the words connect. It’s like in English when you add the letter n to the article to make the connection with the next word starting with a vowel. You would not say “a apple” or “a umbrella” or “a uncle”, would you? “an apple” “an umbrella” and “an uncle” sounds much better. In English, you add a consonant letter in front of words starting with a vowel and in French, you use a form that sounds like the feminine form because the masculine form does not fit (but you still write it differently so people can make spelling mistakes…nouvel/nouvelle, bel/belle, vieil/vieille)

Now, for the adjectives being placed before or after the word really makes the beauty of the French language with the subtle changes in meanings.
For example, if I say “une femme pauvre” (a poor woman), that would means she’s needy and has no money. On the other hand, if I say “une pauvre femme”, that would means she’s unfortunate, you want to pity her, something bad happened to her, like Anna Nicole Smith who is “une pauvre femme” but was certainly not “une femme pauvre”…
It is the same for nouveau-nouvel/nouvelle (before the noun) and neuf/neuve (after the noun): if I say “une nouvelle maison” it means that the house is new but it may be only new for my grands-parents because they just bought it (maybe they even bought an old house but it’s their new address). On the other hand, it I say “une maison neuve” that means that house is brand new, that house was built recently. Anything “neuf” or “neuve” (always placed after the word) means that thing is brand new, has barely never been used before.

If you say; “I have a new address”, you would always say “J’ai une nouvelle addresse”. You will never say “j’ai une addresse neuve” since an address is not an object or a thing that can wear out with use, same for a husband…lol.

One of the answerers before me (politoed316) mentioned the adjectives about colors being after the words. Yes, The White House is La Maison Blanche. It is true in everyday spoken and written language but if you put the adjectives for the colors in front of the words, then suddenly, the whole thing becomes poetic and literary, sometimes used in the names of towns, restaurants or resorts (Verte Vallée - Green Valley)…or fairy tales (Blanche Neige – Snow White), very much used in poetry:

Oh ! sous le vert platane
Sous les frais coudriers,
Diane,
Et ses grands lévriers !

(1/34th of Ballade à la lune – Alfred de Musset)
http://poesie.webnet.fr/poemes/France/musset/1.html

In case you would like to know what that means, “platane” is a plane tree, “coudrier” is a hazel tree. “Diane” is Diana, the virgin Goddess of the hunt in the Roman mythology and “lévriers” are those greyhounds that follow her everywhere. (oh! Under the green plane tree, under the fresh hazel trees, Diana and her big greyhounds). Just click on the link to get the 33 other parts…)

“Sous le vert platane” is very poetic. “Sous le platane vert” is not, just normal, everyday talking.

What you have to know and what your book failed to teach you is that most descriptive adjectives in French, unlike English adjectives, FOLLOW the noun they modify (which is why, after you read some descriptive sentences randomly in your book, you were thinking of just thowing in the adjective right after the noun). Unfortunately, like all French rules, you have exceptions. Here is the list of adjectives that are the exceptions, and unlike others, PRECEDE the nouns: (usually, adjectives with only one syllable are put before the noun)
Beau,
bon,
court,
gentil,
grand,
gros,
jeune,
joli,
long,
mauvais,
méchant,
nouveau,
petit
vieux.

You will notice that both “joli” and “nouveau” are in that list so both adjectives precede the noun because they are exceptions (also as I mentioned before, “nouveau/nouvelle” would become neuf/neuve, after the noun)

A note for jonsinher here: you would never say “un homme beau” in French. “beau” is one of those exceptions (see the list above) that precedes the nouns and since “homme” start with silent h, “beau” becomes “bel” to make the connection with “homme”: un bel homme, un bel oiseau, un bel appartement…

Now all that being said (and I hope read twice by you and assimilated…and reread..), let’s tackle your example sentence:
Voici LA MAISON de mes grands-parents. (nouveau, joli)

Both the adjectives “nouveau” and “joli” are part of the above list of 14 adjectives that are exceptions to the rule and therefore precede the noun, instead of following it, so I guess your teacher would like to test you and find out if you make them precede the noun because you know they are exceptions of it you just throw them after the noun because you just read descriptive sentences randomly in the book…

“Voici la maison de mes grands-parents.” = “Here’s my grands-parents’ house” (kinda neat that grands-parents, even in the English language, is a French word…)
If you want to add the adjective “nouveau”, you first have to think “feminine form” since “maison” is feminine. So you need to add “nouvelle”:
“Voici la nouvelle maison de mes grands-parents.”
If you want to add the adjective “joli”, you first have to think “feminine form” since “maison” is feminine. So you need to add “jolie”, which you would pronounce the same anyway since the last “e” is mute.
“Voici la jolie maison de mes grands-parents.”

The last line of your question asked what you should do if you need to use the two adjectives at once.
So, here’s the house. It’s new and it’s pretty.

Since both “nouvelle” and “jolie” are adjectives that should precedes the noun, because they are exceptions to the rules, you should then write:
“Voici la jolie nouvelle maison de mes grands-parents” or worse: “Voici la nouvelle jolie maison de mes grands-parents”. Both of those sentences would never ever be said by a French person but since they are following the rules, a French teacher who’s not a French native would give you good grade for it…(believe me, I am the teacher who teaches American French teachers.)

OK, think about it in English for a minute: would you say…“Here’s my grands-parents’ pretty new house”. What about “Here’s my grands-parents new pretty house?” How could you explain to a French student learning English that you would really say neither?
In French or English, you really have to separate the adjectives to make things clear and emphasize what is really important to you (the fact that the house is new or the fact that the house is pretty…):
“Here’s my grands-parents’ new house. It’s pretty.” (the house may be old but it’s cute as an English cottage)
“Voici la nouvelle maison de mes grands-parents. Elle est jolie.”
Or: “Here my grands-parents pretty house. It’s new.” (the house has just been built and there’s a cute white little fence around it…)
“Voici la jolie maison de mes grands-parents. Elle est neuve.”

Personally, if I had grands-parents and if they got a new house (new for them of just brand new?) and if their house was pretty…not pretty, beautiful because it’s not a dress, it’s a house: Voici la nouvelle maison de mes grands-parents. C’est une belle maison. (Voici la nouvelle maison neuve de mes grands-parents).

Should a house be pretty? a dress is pretty, a little girl is pretty, a smile is pretty, but a house should just be beautiful or nice.

Answer 2

well in the sentence Voici LA MAISON de mes grands-parents, the adjective "jolie" (joli in feminine), goes right after LA which is the "article". So it does Voici la jolie maison de mes grands-parents. But sometimes, adjectives have to be placed after the noun, and its actually a bit of a mess. Like you can say: "un homme beau" and "un bel homme"

Answer 3

Some adjectives go before some after, your gonna hav to re-arrange the sentense to the following;

La maison nouveau de mes grands-parents est joli.

Answer 4

Voici la nouvelle maison de mes grands-parents.

Voici la jolie maison de mes grands-parents.

If it were a color, it would say "voici le maison blanche de..."