[Scribus] Absolute newbie: typographical symbols

[Bruce R. Miller]

I have been asked to edit and ``typeset" an eight-page
newsletter for a volunteer organization --- within the
next 36 hours! The previous editor (moved to another
city) used Microsoft Publisher. I do not want to use
that, but this is literally learning Scribus ``on the
fly".

With apologies for not doing the work myself to find
the information, can someone point me to any
documentation on:
(1) how to insert common ``typographical" symbols into
plain text files, e.g. endash, emdash, typograthic
apostrophes and quotation marks, bullets (ugh) and the
like.
(2) given where I live in Canada, the newsletter has
to  contain a mixture of English- and French-language
content. My French text displays fine in kvim but not
with cat or less at the command line.
Can someone point me to the hoops I must go through to
ensure correct printing of French accented letters.

Once again, my apologies to all for asking for help
rather than finding the information myself. I am under
intense time pressure and allowed myself only a rapid
look through the Scribus online documentation.

I hope to reach a point to offer back; until then,
thanks in advance.

Bruce Miller
Ottawa, Ontario, Canada