You may already know that Emma Watson was born in France to English parents, but can the The Bling Ring star speak French?
Emma Watson can speak French, but admittedly not fluently. Since she was born in Paris, France, Emma Watson was exposed heavily to the language until the age of five. Both of her parents are English and they spoke the English language at home. Despite that, Emma has continuously made it her New Year’s resolution to speak French fluenty.
Scroll down to read more about Emma Watson’s time in France and her long time goal of speaking French fluently.
Early Years in Paris
As mentioned above, Emma Watson was born in Paris, France where the language of love is from. Since she was born in France, she was heavily exposed to the French language as a young child.
This is important to know because the younger you are when you are exposed to a language, the easier it is to remember how to speak it later on in life.
When Emma was still very young, her family moved back to England and she was no longer exposed as heavily to the French language. She did tell The New Arab in 2017 that “I lived here [Paris] for about three years, before moving with my family to England. I continued to visit France frequently until I was a teenager.”
Emma’s New Years Resolution to Speak French Fluently
It was in 2013 that Emma told the world what her New Year’s resolution was and that it is usually the same resolution every year. She said in a Marie Claire interview (quoted by People magazine) “I always have the same New Year’s resolution: to speak French fluently. I get a huge wave of nostalgia when I come into the Gare du Nord. There’s such an emphasis on culture, art and music. And I’ll do anything for a warm baguette.”
Like anything, going that extra step to become completely proficient in something can be difficult. However, Watson has a drive that has been hereditarily ingrained in her by her parents, Jacqueline Luesby and Chris Watson. Watson has even said that “both my parents love their work and it’s a big part of their identity.” This could explain why Watson has been so committed to her acting career and any new goal she chooses.
With all of that said, it’s clear that if Emma Watson says she is going to learn to speak French fluently, she will follow through with the goal. That’s even if it takes her a long time. She is known to be a bit of a perfectionist, even admitting “”I’m a bit OCD about perfectionism. I’m my own worst critic. I think that’s really hard but it also spurs me on.”
Watson Not Fluent Yet, But Getting There
As of now, it doesn’t appear that Emma Watson has hit that goal of speaking French fluently. That, of course, doesn’t mean that she doesn’t try to speak the language whenever she can. She has said “I speak French and normally enjoy talking to journalists I meet in France in French – as long as they don’t object!”
As for any public interviews? Well Emma Watson has yet to conduct an interview entirely in French. It probably has to do with her admitted OCD that was mentioned above. With a little digging, you can find videos where she does speak a little bit of French.
If you follow the below YouTube link, you can watch an interview where she does respond to the interviewer in a full French sentence. Her accent is also quite good.
While Emma Watson doesn’t speak French fluently yet, we have faith that she will achieve the goal eventually. One day, she will likely surprise the whole world by holding an entire conversation in French with a perfect accent.