sono poche le piante in grado di sopravvivere, le più elette

[Kim Gordon]

Hi everyone!

Could you please help me review this phrase?

Original:
- A questa altitudine sono poche le piante in grado di sopravvivere, le più elette.

My tries:
- At this altitude, a few plants are able to survive, [only] the finest ones/the most select;
- At this altitude, not many plants are able to survive, only a select few;

Any ideas to make it sound more natural?

Thank you!

 

[HalfTaff]

Perhaps "Only the fittest plants can survive at this altitude" - "fittest", of course, being in the Darwinian sense.

 

[rrose17]

I prefer the word hardy here but perhaps it’s a bit far from the original. Otherwise to make yours sound a little more natural I might suggest
Only a few of the most select plants are able to survive at this altitude.

 

[Kim Gordon]

Perhaps "Only the fittest plants can survive at this altitude" - "fittest", of course, being in the Darwinian sense.

Thank you so much, HalfTaff! I should've given a better context in my post earlier, but I need to preserve the "poetic" tone in the sentence. Do you have any other ideas?

 

[Kim Gordon]

I prefer the word hardy here but perhaps it’s a bit far from the original. Otherwise to make yours sound a little more natural I might suggest
Only a few of the most select plants are able to survive at this altitude.

Thank you!

I like your suggestion. Reordering the words, could this work? Can I say "only the most select", or do I have to say "only the most select ones".

At this altitude, a few plants are able to survive, only the most select/only the most select ones.

Thanks again.

 

[rrose17]

To make it sound a little better I’d go with
At this altitude, few plants survive, only the most select are able.
At this altitude few plants, only the most select, survive.
I think the second one is better.

 

[HalfTaff]

Rrose's suggestion of "hardy" is the obvious term to use. Can't think why it didn't occur to me. "Select" sounds distinctly odd to me in this context.

(Cross-posted).

 

[johngiovanni]

"Only the chosen few."