De gré ou de force

Meaning: Willingly or unwillingly; one way or another.

Language: French

Literally: By goodwill or by force

Category: Daily Life

Origin: Gré is consent, from Latin gratum, what is pleasing. The pairing is a legal formula that survives in ordinary speech as a threat.

More idioms — Daily Life

Le Grenelle de quelque chose — A large multi-party negotiation convened to settle a national issue.
L'habit ne fait pas le moine — Appearances do not establish what someone is.
C'est de l'hébreu — It is completely incomprehensible.
Vieux comme Hérode — Extremely ancient.
Un combat homérique — A struggle of epic scale and duration.
Un homme averti en vaut deux — Advance warning doubles a person's effectiveness.

Honi soit qui mal y pense — Let anyone who reads something improper into this be the one disgraced.
À huis clos — In closed session, with the public excluded.
Mettre à l'index — To blacklist something or exclude it from acceptable use.
Un violon d'Ingres — A serious passion pursued outside one's actual profession.
Un coup de Jarnac — An unexpected decisive stroke, delivered within the rules but not quite sportingly.
Jeux de mains, jeux de vilains — Horseplay ends badly.

Tête de mule — An impossibly stubborn person who refuses to change their mind no matter what.
C'est une vraie chèvre — They're hopelessly stubborn and infuriating — a goat that refuses to be moved.
Casse-pieds — A massive bore or pain in the neck — someone who wears you down with their irritating way…

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