Expressions avec En

The pronoun en normally replaces de + noun phrase — je parle de mes vacances becomes j'en parle. But in a substantial set of high-frequency expressions, en has frozen into the verb and lost any reference you can recover. J'en ai marre is "I'm fed up" — but fed up of what, exactly? Je m'en vais is "I'm leaving" — leaving from what? These idioms can't be reverse-engineered into a de-phrase, because there isn't one. Like the frozen-y expressions, they have to be learned whole.

This page covers the most common frozen-en idioms in modern French. They are, without exaggeration, the lifeblood of informal speech: a French speaker frustrated, leaving, coping, recovering, being impressed, or simply wrapping up a task is almost certainly using one of them. Master this list and you'll sound dramatically more natural in everyday conversation.

What "frozen en" means

In je veux un croissant → j'en veux un ("I want one"), the en is alive: it points back to des croissants and you can recover the noun. In j'en ai marre, the en points to nothing — there is no specific de phrase you could substitute back. En has welded into the verb to become part of the idiom, just as y has frozen into il y a and ça y est.

The test is the same: can you recover what en refers to? If you can ("j'en veux trois" → recover "des croissants"), it's literal en. If you can't ("j'en ai marre" → fed up of what?), it's frozen en, and you should treat the whole expression as a unit.

The expressions below cluster into a few semantic groups: states of frustration (en avoir marre, en avoir assez, en avoir ras-le-bol), motion and departure (s'en aller, s'en venir), coping and recovery (s'en sortir, s'en remettre, en revenir), wrapping up (en finir avec, en venir à), and a handful of standalone idioms. We'll go through them in roughly that order.

en avoir marre — to be fed up

En avoir marre is the everyday expression for being fed up, sick of something, at the end of one's patience. It's slightly informal but neutral enough for any conversational register. To specify what you're fed up with, attach de + noun or de + infinitive — and notice that this de is separate from the frozen en, even though it looks redundant.

The double de-pattern (j'en ai marre de X) feels strange to English speakers, but it's the standard form. In casual speech, the de can be elided in fast tempo (j'en ai marre, du coup), but the citation form keeps it.

en avoir assez — to have had enough

A slightly more measured cousin of en avoir marre. En avoir assez sounds less colloquial and more controlled — it's what a parent says before en avoir marre takes over. The construction is identical: en avoir assez de + noun/infinitive.

en avoir ras-le-bol — to be sick to death of it

The slangiest of the frustration trio. Ras-le-bol literally means "level with the bowl" — the image is of frustration filled up to the brim, about to overflow. It's stronger than en avoir marre and noticeably informal. You'll hear it everywhere in spoken French, but it would be slightly out of place in a job interview.

The noun ras-le-bol exists independently: un ras-le-bol général ("a widespread feeling of frustration"), often used in journalism about social discontent.

s'en aller — to leave, go away

S'en aller is one of two ways to say "to leave" in French (the other being partir). The frozen en makes the verb pronominal-and-prepositional in a way that partir isn't. Conjugation is regular for aller, with the reflexive pronoun and the frozen en both present in every form.

The imperative va-t'en (singular informal), allons-nous-en (let's go away), allez-vous-en (plural or formal) deserves its own attention. Note the apostrophe in va-t'en: this is te elided before the vowel of en, and it's spelled with an apostrophe, not a hyphen. Va-t-en (with hyphen) would imply a third-person object pronoun, which is wrong here.

There's also a poetic, slightly elevated use of s'en aller to mean "to die" — il s'en est allé doucement ("he passed away peacefully"). This sense survives in obituaries and ceremonial speech.

s'en faire — to worry

S'en faire means "to worry, to fret." It almost always appears in the negative — ne t'en fais pas is the standard French way to reassure someone, the equivalent of "don't worry."

The expression has a stronger and slightly older variant s'en faire pour quelqu'un ("to be worried about someone"). In modern speech, s'inquiéter covers similar ground but feels more clinical; s'en faire is warmer and more conversational.

s'en sortir — to manage, to get through, to pull through

This is one of the most useful verbs in conversational French. S'en sortir covers everything from "to manage" (handle a difficult task) to "to pull through" (recover from illness or hardship) to "to get away with" (escape consequences). The shared meaning is exiting a difficult situation successfully.

The opposite — failing to cope — is ne pas s'en sortir. Je ne m'en sors pas avec ce dossier means "I'm drowning in this file." This negative form is heard daily in offices and homes everywhere.

s'en remettre — to get over, to recover

S'en remettre means "to recover from, to get over" — usually a shock, a loss, a breakup, an illness. It carries the connotation of emotional or psychological recovery, though it can be physical too.

There's a closely related but distinct expression s'en remettre à quelqu'un, meaning "to put oneself in someone's hands, defer to them": je m'en remets à votre jugement ("I defer to your judgment"). The en and the construction differ slightly, but the same lexical block is involved.

en finir avec — to be done with, finish off

En finir avec X expresses a strong desire to bring something to a definitive end. It's heavier than simply finir X — it suggests exhaustion, frustration, or determination. The en here is frozen, the avec introduces the object.

In a darker register, en finir alone (without avec) can mean "to end one's life" — il a voulu en finir. This use exists but is somber and rare in everyday speech; mention it only because you'll meet it in literature or news.

en venir à — to come to, get to (a topic, a state)

En venir à describes arriving at a topic, conclusion, or state — often after some buildup. J'en viens à mon point ("I'm coming to my point") is the textbook example. With + infinitive, it can also mean "to be reduced to, to come to the point of."

The interrogative où veux-tu en venir ? ("what are you getting at?") is one of the most useful conversational questions in French — used when someone's preamble is going on too long.

en revenir — to get over it / to believe it

En revenir is double-edged. In one sense it means "to get over" something (similar to s'en remettre but more commonly used for shock or surprise). In another sense, especially in the negative, it means "to be unable to believe" something — je n'en reviens pas ! ("I can't believe it!").

This je n'en reviens pas is a high-frequency reaction phrase — the French equivalent of "no way!" or "I can't believe it!" It's neutral in register and works in any conversation.

en passer par — to go through, undergo

En passer par describes going through something — a difficult experience, a required procedure, a process you can't skip. It often carries a sense of resignation: there's no way around it.

en prendre pour son grade — to get told off

A vivid colloquial idiom: en prendre pour son grade (literally "to take some for one's rank") means "to get a serious telling-off, get reamed out." The image is military — taking criticism appropriate to one's level. It's informal and slightly humorous.

en valoir la peine — to be worth it

En valoir la peine means "to be worth the trouble." The subject is usually impersonal ça or a thing being judged. The negative ça n'en vaut pas la peine ("it's not worth it") is one of the most common dismissals in French.

A close relative en valoir le coup (informal, identical meaning) is heard everywhere in casual speech: ça vaut le coup d'y aller ("it's worth going").

en imposer (à) — to be impressive, command respect

En imposer describes someone or something whose presence commands respect or admiration without trying. It's a slightly literary register — you'll meet it in journalism, biographies, character descriptions.

This is one of the rare frozen-en expressions that lean toward formal or written register. Don't confuse it with imposer (to impose), which is a very different verb.

j'en ai pour deux minutes — it'll take me two minutes

A specific time-expression idiom worth its own entry. En avoir pour + duration means "to need / take that long for something." The frozen en refers vaguely to "the task at hand" without specifying.

The construction also works for amounts of money: j'en ai eu pour cinquante euros ("it cost me fifty euros") — vague en referring to whatever was bought.

How French differs from English here

English doesn't have a clitic pronoun that operates like en. The closest analogues are of it / about it / from it — and the differences are revealing. In English, when you say "I'm fed up with it," the preposition and pronoun are explicit. In French, j'en ai marre compresses both into a single weld of en into the verb. This means English speakers tend to over-translate or under-translate:

The over-translation error: trying to render en in English. J'en ai marre is "I'm fed up," not "I'm fed up of it." Je m'en vais is "I'm leaving," not "I'm going away from it."

The under-translation error: dropping en in French because English would. Saying j'ai marre instead of j'en ai marre is wrong — en is required by the idiom even though English has no equivalent.

A subtler trap is the de that follows many of these expressions (j'en ai marre *de cette pluie, en finir **avec ça). These are part of the idiom's own complementation — they have nothing to do with the frozen *en — and they can't be skipped. Saying j'en ai marre cette pluie without de is ungrammatical.

Common Mistakes

Key takeaways

Frozen-en expressions share a structural logic: a verb that originally took a de-complement has lost the ability to make that complement explicit, and en has been welded into the verb permanently. Modern speakers no longer feel the en as a pronoun in these idioms — it's just part of how the verb is spelled.

The expressions divide cleanly by register. Neutral, everyday: en avoir marre, en avoir assez, s'en aller, s'en sortir, en finir avec, en venir à, en revenir, en valoir la peine, j'en ai pour X. Slightly slangier: en avoir ras-le-bol, en prendre pour son grade. Slightly more literary: en imposer. Master the neutral set first — these alone will transform your spoken French — then add the rest as you become comfortable.

Together with the frozen-y expressions covered separately, these idioms account for an enormous proportion of what makes French sound French. Pay attention to them every time you watch a French film or read dialogue, and you'll notice them everywhere.