An Introduction to French Pronunciation

Mute e 85
than one word may in certain circumstances condition his
or her pronunciation. In particular, rule 4 often does not
apply when a mute e at the end of a word is preceded by two
consonants but followed (i.e. at the beginning of the next
word) by only one consonant, e.g. il parl(e) beaucoup /il parl
boku/, la forc(e) de frappe /la fbrs dc frap/.
It has been shown (Dauzes, 1973: 48) that the /c/ is more
likely to be retained when the syllable immediately following
takes a main stress than when it does not, e.g. c’est un texte
court /sεt j tεkstc ku:r/, il reste là /il rεstc la/, une porte verte
/yn pbrtc vεrt/, but c’est un texte connu /sεt j tεkst kbny/, il
reste couché /il rεst kuʃe/, une porte fermée /yn pbrt fεrme/
– but this is a tendency, not a rule, and pronunciations such
as /yn pbrt vεrt/ are perfectly possible.
Note that the tendency to drop the e does not in any case
apply to quelque(s), e.g. quelque distance /kεlkc diste:s/,
quelques jours /kεlkc ʒu:r/.
11.7.3 At the end of the first part of compound words such
as garde-boue, porte-monnaie, the mute e is normally pronounced
if the second part is a monosyllable, e.g. garde-boue
/gardcbu/, porte-clefs /pbrtckle/, porte-plume /pbrtcplym /,
but is frequently (though not invariably) dropped when the
second part has more than one syllable, e.g. gard(e)-barrière
/gardbarjε:r/, port(e)-monnaie /pbrtmbnε/ (compare 11.7.2).
11.7.4 So strong is the tendency to pronounce a mute e
after a cluster of two consonants that one may be introduced
even when there is no corresponding e in writing. This is
particularly true of (un) ours blanc /ursc ble / and (un) ours
brun /ursc brj/, but it may sometimes occur elsewhere, e.g.
l’ex-roi /lεkscrwa/, (un) film muet /filmc mdε/ for the more
usual /lεksrwa/, /film mdε /.