Gretchen
Gretchen is in German the diminutive of the prémon Margarete (Marguerite) as well as Greta (see Greta Garbo) or Gretl (see the Heimatfilm Dame Gretl).
Differences in connotations
This first name has German and French connotations entirely opposed.
In German, this first name evokes a pure young girl, celebrates it Marguerite allured by the doctor Faust (see the opera éponyme of Charles Gounod).
It is used in a phrase become proverbial: " the question of Marguerite" (in German Die Gretchen-Frage ) which was in the beginning that posed to Doctor Faust as for his attitude with respect to the religion (he believes in a God?), which he answers while skewing. Today, it applies to any question seeking to push a political adversary to give an opinion ( kind frankly speak, known as all the truth ).
The Propaganda anti-allemande carried out by the French governments to the capacity between the conflicts of 1870 and 1914-1918 gave to this French name a pejorative connotation. It designated a long time a girl fatty, uncultivated, badly equipped, in short ridiculous. It is during misogynist of chleuh , Boche , Schwob etc
This is undoubtedly dependant following the sounds " t" and " ch" (typical of the language German and hard for the Latin ears) which evokes brutal actions as in the onomatopoeias tchac , tchou-tchou etc
Many words containing of the diphthongs including/understanding these sounds are used to designate ridiculous characters. See for example the exclamation of Charlie Chaplin Chtonk in its film the Dictator parodying Adolf Hitler. The business of the forgeries Carnets of Hitler was filmed and the German title of film is Schtonk!, in homage to Charlie Chaplin. The same applies to name of the pigeon in the part of Marcel Pagnol Schpountz .
As for the Schtroumpf S of the cartoon, they were renamed Schlumpf (plural Schlümpfe ) in the language of Goethe since this word (spelled Strumpf ) wants to say sock …
Notorious exception, the song of Georges Brassens Between the street Didot and the street of Vanves : “A beautiful gretchen Passed to the crossroads of the Castle…” (but one knew already Marlène Dietrich, Maria Schell and one can suppose that it had met at the time of its passage (STO obliges) to Basdorf fair, large and thin Prussians like Claudia Schiffer or pulpy like Veronica Bottle pincers at its beginnings.