An Introduction to French Pronunciation

50 Stress
(i) Emphatic stress on the first syllable:
C’est un château magnifique /sε tj ʃato 'maifik/
Fermez la porte /'ferme la pbrt/
Il fait beau ce soir /il fε 'bo sc swa:r/
Je n’ai jamais dit ça! /ʒc ne 'ʒame di sa/
(ii) Emphatic stress on the second syllable:
J’ai un problème insoluble /ʒe j prbblεm h'sblybl/
Ce dictionnaire | est tout à fait indispensable /sc diksjbnε:r |
ε tut a fε h'dispesabl/
Quelle idée ahurissante! /kεl ide a'yrise:t/
9.5.2 The emphatic stress can, however, fall on the initial
syllable even if it begins with a vowel, particularly in utterances
of an exclamatory nature, e.g. 'absolument! /'apsblyme/,
'impossible! /'hpbsibl/, 'ouvrez la porte! /'uvre la pbrt/,
'attendez-moi! /'atedemwa/, 'incroyable! /'hkrwajabl/. In
a sense, the exception is often apparent rather than real, in
that, in such cases, the syllable taking the emphatic stress
begins with a glottal stop (see 14.6), e.g. ['ʔapsblyme], which
serves the same function as an initial consonant.
In other cases, a liaison consonant carried over from the
preceding word (see chapter 19) serves as the ‘consonne
d’insistance’, e.g. c’es't impossible! /sε 'thpbsibl/, troi's
énormes camions /trwa 'zenbrm kamjf/, se's innombrables
enfants /se 'zinfbrablc zefe/, que'l imbécile! /kε 'lhbesil/.
9.5.3 Two additional features to be noted in relation to
emphatic stress are:
(i) that the stressed syllable is pronounced at a higher pitch
than would otherwise be the case
(ii) that the initial consonant is frequently lengthened, i.e.
its articulation is prolonged; this added length can be indicated
in phonetic script by a colon, e.g. quelle 'belle maison! [kεl
'b:εl mεzf], 'magnifique! ['m:aifik], j’ai 'trop de travail
[ʒe 't:ro d travaj], in'dispensable [h'd:ispesabl].