Abstract
The article is centered on the role emotions play while a foreign language is learnt. Which of the following factors prevail on the learner: the enchantment of words, the magic of sounds or the anxiety linked to linguistic uncertainty and frustration due to lack of comprehension? After revising the place of emotions in the languages'didactics history, we are going to show both the universality of emotions and their cultural component. The examples provided during this lecture have been taken from three foreign authors who studied French with a different degree of joy or suffering.