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Je n'aperçois guère la typographie de cette édition.

Je n'aperçois guère la typographie de cette édition.
I can barely see the typography of this edition.
From Lesson 336:Restrictive negation (ne... guère)·French

Questions & Answers about Je n'aperçois guère la typographie de cette édition.

How does ne... guère work here, and is it used in everyday spoken French?
The structure ne... guère means hardly, barely, or scarcely. It frames the conjugated verb just like ne... pas, giving us Je n'aperçois guère. However, it is quite literary and formal. In everyday conversation, a French speaker would be more likely to say Je vois à peine (I can barely see).
Why use apercevoir instead of voir in this sentence?
While voir is the general word for to see, apercevoir means to catch sight of, to glimpse, or to make out. Combined with guère, it emphasizes the physical difficulty of making out the faint or tiny print of this specific edition.
Why does aperçois have a cedilla (ç) here?
The cedilla is required to keep the soft s sound of the infinitive apercevoir. In French, the letter c before an o makes a hard k sound. Adding the cedilla changes it back to a soft s sound before the vowels a, o, or u.
Do I need to use pas with ne... guère?
No, you never use pas with guère. Just like jamais or plus, the word guère replaces pas as the second half of the negative structure.

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