I picked up a Miss Manner's etiquette book at the library the other day and have been reading it a little here and there. Her personality is quite entertaining if you haven't read anything by her before. She's definitely good for a giggle.
Anyway, I learned something. And don't you want to know what it is?
The correct way to ask for a reply to an invitation is to use the acronym
RsvpNot RSVP. If you capitalize it all, you may as well yell: RESPOND PLEASE! And that would just be rude.
And you should never say "Rsvp please" because that is redundant.
The "svp" means
s'il vous plaîtIn other words: Please.
Now, aren't you so glad you have this new information? Your life is about to improve dramatically.
5 comments:
Thank you for the enlightenment. However, I just sent out invites for my daughter's 13th birthday party and not even 1/2 of the people have Rsvp'ed. I wish I COULD yell it! So many people don't have the courtesy these days to actually Rsvp so maybe doing it in all capitals would be a good idea?
Faith
Of course, excuse any of my grammar faults...
I know, I know. It really is pathetic that people can't be bothered to take 2 min to check their calendar and another 2 min to reply to the invite. Miss Manners recommends then calling all the non-replyers and saying sweetly: I'm going to shopping today for Sarah's birthday party and wanted to see if your daughter was planning to come. I didn't receive her Rsvp yet.
It's not fair, of course, but it sure beats over-buying for a party in my opinion!
This is an age old problem. Rsvp means, "Reply if you please." So it leaves the invitee with an out. They choose "not to please," not because they know what Rsvp means, but because they are lazy. That's why many hostesses now write, "Reply if declining," and most folks don't even reply to that. The rule of thumb is to invite twice as many people as you want, and expect half. i've seen it work and I've seen it fail.
Merci beaucoup. :)
I think we have a mind-meld. I very recently studied the meaning of rsvp with my children!
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