Translating “Riding a roller coaster is very exciting” requires a little cultural adjustment. A literal translation often sounds clunky or accidentally suggests sexual arousal (a common pitfall with the word excitant).
Option 1: The “Thrill” Focus (Best)
“Faire des montagnes russes, c’est palpitant !” (Doing roller coasters is heart-pounding/thrilling!)
Note: Palpitant relates to your heart beating fast (palpitations), which fits perfectly.
Option 2: The “Adrenaline” Focus
“Faire des montagnes russes, c’est grisant !” (Doing roller coasters is exhilarating!)
Note: Grisant implies a sort of intoxication from speed or wind.
Option 3: The “Fun” Focus (Casual)
“Faire des montagnes russes, c’est trop fort !” (Doing roller coasters is intense/awesome!)
Note: Trop fort is common slang for something impressive or intense.
It fits in the sense that it literally makes your heart beat faster, but I doubt you will hear many people use the word “palpitant” to describe “les montagnes russes”. You may find this word in books though.
Same thing. I don’t think “grisant” is commonly used in spoken French. I mean, I’m guessing it’s more common than “palpitant”, but that doesn’t mean much
I see! Perhaps one could just say “amusant” / “cool”? It’s not really the same meaning as exciting, it conveys that it’s fun which somewhat related to the intent in English of saying “Riding a roller coaster is very exciting.”
These words are commonly used, but as you said they don’t really convey the meaning of exciting.
Speaking of which… What is the meaning of exciting in this context?
Enthusiasm? Eagerness?
There are words that can express these ideas, for instance:
enthousiasmant = which causes enthusiasm
avoir hâte de = to be eager (look forward to)
but I feel like they don’t really work here.
Does “exciting” also encompasses, intense emotions and the “exhilarating” idea?
“Intense” is kind of interesting: I think this word pretty much has the same meaning in French and in English, but again I feel it’s not quite the same as “exciting”.
So… On the one hand I am not thrilled with Gemini’s suggestions, but on the other hand, I can’t really think of anything better.
Palpitant: looks really good “on paper”. Talking about spoken French however, I have heard “palpitant” used as a noun (“le palpitant”, meaning the heart), but never as an adjective to describe high-adrenaline activities. That’s just me though.
Grisant: Gemini defines “grisant” as exhilarating. I think that’s right and to be fair to Gemini, even if it’s been a while, I have actually heard people use that word in similar contexts (high-adrenaline stuff / “Sensations fortes”).
Also, even if “excitant” may not be perfect either here, I don’t think it is as bad as Gemini’s explanation may lead you to believe: It does not always imply sexual arousal. Take this example for instance:
Le défi n’en reste pas moins excitant.
It could be translated as: “Still, the challenge remains exciting.”
On “faire des montagnes russes” vs. “faire les montagnes russes” vs "faire un tour sur les montagnes russes:
faire les montagnes russes = Roller coaster riding (in general) - I’d say that’s the default in French, kind of a set phrase.
faire des montagnes russes = I see Gemini uses “des” in all his examples. Not great… I think les should be used instead.
un tour sur les montagnes russes (could also be un tour de montagnes russes) = I think the reason why the translator used “un tour sur les” is because the English sentence says “Riding a roller coaster” (as opposed to “Roller coaster riding”). “Faire les montagnes russes” sounds more natural to me, but some people may argue that the given translation is more precise.
Yeah, I suppose that the sentence is open to many different interpretations, so it could mean fun, expressing enthusiasm, eagerness so there are many possible ways it could be translated if it was part of a longer passage that had more context.
Thank you for the additional detail on excitant and on the difference between des, les, and un tour sur les
