Learning French: charbonner and more phrases to describe hard work

Vocabulary from the grown-up world of employment is obviously not on the radar of most school children learning the French language, so the notion of working hard – and the many French expressions that express ‘serious graft’ – are not something to be learnt at school.

Yet the French have many ways to describe how hard they have been working (within the legal confines of their 35 hour week, bien sûr!), and boy do they let you know about it at any given opportunity.

What is the meaning of bosser comme un taré?

One such phrase was proclaimed by a friend recently, right before she was due to go on holiday. “J’ai bossé comme une tarée,” she announced of her last-minute employment frenzy before heading off to the beach for a week. I should state that she is a local government fonctionnaire (civil servant) and seems to get about 10 weeks paid holiday a year – so has plenty of time to recuperate.

I knew that bosser was the semi-slang French word used by most people for 'to work' but I had no idea what a tarée (or was it spelled taret?) was – prompting some research.

It turns out a taré (masculin), or tarée (feminine) is interchangeable with un fou or une folle (a mad person) so the phrase means ‘I’ve been working like crazy’.

Digging into the etymology of taré – on the most useful of websites run by the Centre National des Ressources Textuelles et Lexicales – revealed that it first appeared in the early 16th Century referring to a person ‘afflicted with a defect (physical or psychological)’, thus implying a disability. 

Hence it is probably not advisable to use it, to avoid causing offence.

More words and phrases to describe hard work

Alternative phrases referring to hard work include:

• Etre au taquet - To work flat out
• Charbonner – A slang verb meaning to slog away at something (charbon is the French word for coal) 
• Trimer - A verb used by younger generations to describe hard work, which can also refer to the idea of suffering from something

• Galérer - An informal way of saying you are struggling to do something

• Travailler dur - To work hard  

• Travailler comme un(e) acharné(e) - To work relentlessly 

• Mettre la main à la pâte - To get down to business