FR French · neutral · 1 of 5
appeler un chat un chat
brisk, unfooled
Word by word
call · a · cat · a · cat
Idiomatic sense
To call a thing by its plain name, including when the plain name is awkward. The cat is a cat. The project is late. The remark was rude. The phrase refuses a euphemism.
It is about the wording, not about emptying one's heart to a friend. That closer, more private candor is 腹を割って話す.
Examples
Autant appeler un chat un chat : le projet a du retard.
Let's call it what it is. The project is late.
Elle appelle un chat un chat, même quand ça dérange.
She says the plain thing, even when it makes the room uncomfortable.
Equivalents
Marks say how far the other phrase travels with this one. How to read them.
- near
to call a spade a spade
Same refusal of euphemism. The tool is different. Some English speakers now hear the spade phrase as dated or as tangled in other uses of the word. The job is still the one this entry means.
- near
A person who will not soften a point. A habit, where the French phrase is also something one can decide to do in a single sentence.
- near
das Kind beim Namen nennen
To call the child by its name. Same demand that the thing be named.
- partial
Opening an honest conversation. More private, and more mutual, than naming a public fact in blunt words.
Notes
The English translation in the first example does not mention a cat. That is deliberate. The French sentence's point is the lateness, and the cat is only the instruction about how to speak.
Sources
- Standard idiom. Wording is original.