unsure of two usages of "autant"

I’m unsure of two usages of “autant.” There were two examples for this usage: “Leur promesses sont autant de mensonges” and “Il les considère comme autant de clients potentiels.”

Using this example, would the French say for “I consider him my friend” “Je le considère comme autant mon ami.”? Could “autant” come before “comme”? Would it be OK to just say “je le considère comme mon ami”?

The other usage is “believe me...” example given: “Believe me, he wasn’t pleased.” “J’aime autant te dire qu’il n’était pas contente.”

It’s an easy construction to learn but I would like to know if this is, in fact, used.

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Permalink Reply by Neil Coffey on March 22, 2012 at 4:46pm

Your expression "(sont) autant de...", which literally means something like "(are) just as many...", only works with something that is countable or quantifiable. For example, "autant de pluie/problèmes" = "just as much rain/just as many problems".

To say "I consider him my/a friend", you can just say "Je le considère comme (un) ami". You don't actually need any article at all in this case. Probably "un" would be more common than "mon", though. which I think would be a bit ambiguous (it would imply something like "I consider him to be similar to my friend").

For your last expression, I'm not sure I'd translate it as "Believe me". I think the idea is more like "If you ask me, you may as well say that...", "If you ask me, that amounts to saying that..." -- a bit more literally, "I'd be just as keen to say that .... (as to express it in any other way)". I think it's more common just to say "Autant dire que...", but you will see this version used.