/il nə fo pa puse meme dɑ̃ lez‿ɔʁti/ lit. ‘don’t push granny into the nettles’
French idiom, familiar. Don’t push it, that’s going too far.
Draft Not yet checked by a native French speaker.
How do people use Il ne faut pas pousser mémé dans les orties
?
Familiar and jokey, said to someone who’s asking for too much or taking liberties. In speech the “il ne” nearly always drops: “faut pas pousser mémé dans les orties!”. It also works as a plain verb, “tu pousses mémé dans les orties” (you’re overdoing it), and people often cut it to just “faut pas pousser!”.
Also said faut pas pousser mémé dans les orties, pousser mémé dans les orties, pousser mamie dans les orties
Il ne faut pas pousser mémé dans les orties
in real sentences
-
Faut pas pousser mémé dans les orties !
Don’t push it too far!
Tatoeba, sentence by GeeZ, translation by GeeZ, CC BY 2.0 FR
-
J’ai poussé mémé dans les orties.
I went too far.
Tatoeba, sentence by Fenrir, CC BY 2.0 FR
Where does Il ne faut pas pousser mémé dans les orties
come from?
Nobody has pinned it down. French Wiktionary marks the etymology of the full sentence as unwritten, and its entry for “pousser mémé dans les orties” says, without a source, that it’s a humorous twist on “il ne faut pas pousser mémé vers la sortie” (don’t push granny towards the exit). It’s a plausible story, but there’s no dated first use to back it up. What’s clear is that it spawned a whole family of copies, with uncles in thistles and grannies in hydrangeas.
Mistakes learners make with Il ne faut pas pousser mémé dans les orties
Translating “don’t push it” word for word as “ne le pousse pas”. French hears that as an instruction about a physical object. Granny and the nettles are what turn pushing into overdoing it, or use the short “faut pas pousser”.
Other French idioms like Il ne faut pas pousser mémé dans les orties
Spot a mistake in Il ne faut pas pousser mémé dans les orties
?
Send a correction, or a sentence you’d actually say with it. Everything is read before anything on this page changes.