French verbs
Encyclopedia
French
verb
s are a part of speech in French grammar
. Each verb lexeme
has a collection of finite and non-finite forms in its conjugation
scheme.
Finite forms depend on grammatical tense
and person
/number. There are eight simple tense–aspect–mood forms, categorized into the indicative, subjunctive
and imperative
mood
s, with the conditional mood
sometimes viewed as an additional category. The eight simple forms can also be categorized into four tenses (future, present, past, and future-of-the-past), or into two aspects
(perfective
and imperfective
).
The three non-finite moods are the infinitive
, past participle, and present participle.
There are also compound constructions that use more than verb. These include one for each simple tense with the addition of "avoir" or "être" as an auxiliary verb. There is also a construction which is used to distinguish passive voice from active voice.
by isolating the stem of the verb and adding an ending. In the first and second conjugation, the stem is easily identifiable from the infinitive
, and remains essentially constant throughout the paradigm. For example, the stem of parler ("speak") is parl- and the stem of finir ("finish") is fin-. In the third group, the relationship between the infinitive form and the stem is less consistent, and several distinct stems are needed to produce all the forms in the paradigm. For example, the verb boire ("drink") has the stems boi-, boiv-, bu-, and buv-.
The ending depends on the mood
, tense
, aspect
, and voice of the verb, as well as on the person
and number
of its subject
. Every conjugation exhibits some degree of syncretism
, where the same (homophonous, and possibly also homographic) form is used to realize distinct combinations of grammatical features. This is most noticeable for -er verbs. For instance, the conjugated form parle can be the 1st or 3rd person singular indicative or subjunctive form of parler, or the singular familiar imperative. Furthermore, the 2nd person singular indicative and subjunctive form parles and the 3rd person plural form parlent are pronounced the same way as parle (except in liaison
contexts). The prevalence of syncretism in conjugation paradigms is one functional explanation for the fact that French does not allow null subjects
, unlike most of the other Romance languages.
moods (les modes impersonnels), also called verbals, and finite
ones (les modes personnels).
(le subjonctif). As discussed below, sometimes the conditional is recognized as a fourth mood. While the rules that determine the correct mood are quite complex, they are simplified and summarized in the following table:
Many linguists recognize a fourth mood, the conditional
(le conditionnel), which is used in almost exactly the same circumstances as the conditional in English. In French, « Je le ferais si j'avais assez de temps » is "I would do it if I had enough time" in English. Other linguists consider the conditional to be a tense of the indicative mood. The two camps do not disagree on the rules for when and how to use the conditional. A third camp recognizes both "conditionnel présent / conditionnel passé" (for use in conditional sentences), and "indicatif futur du passé / indicatif futur antérieur du passé" (for tense concords, "future from a past point-of-view"), but they recognize also that both are conjugated the same.
) tense-aspect forms, conveying four tenses (times of action) (future, present, past, and future-of-past) and two aspects (fabrics of time) (perfective
, conveying an action viewed in its entirety without its time frame being considered in more detail, and imperfective
, conveying an action that occurs repetitively or continuously). The tense-aspect forms of the indicative mood in French are called the present (le présent: present tense, imperfective aspect), the simple past (le passé simple
: past tense, perfective aspect), the imperfect (l'imparfait: past tense, imperfective aspect), the future (le futur: future tense, unspecified aspect), and the conditional (le conditionnel: future-in-past tense, unspecified aspect). Note that, as discussed above, in some uses the conditional can be considered a separate mood completely, while in other uses it is the future-in-past tense of the indicative. The use of the various tense forms is described in the following table:
Additionally, the indicative has five compound (two-word) tense-aspect forms, each of which is formed analogously to the perfect in languages such as English (e.g., "have done") (though in French this form does not indicate the perfect aspect) as applied to one of the above simple tense forms. These tense forms are used to indicate events before the corresponding simple tense forms; for example, « À ce moment-là, il se souvint de ce qu'il avait promis » ("At that moment, he remembered what he had promised"). In addition, except in literature or very formal speeches, the present perfect form is used in modern French wherever the simple past would have been used in older or more literary writing. Since this use is much more common than its use as a true present perfect, it is usually called the compound past (le passé composé
). Further, where older or more literary French would have used the perfect form of the simple past tense (le passé antérieur) for the past-of-the-past, modern non-literary French uses the pluperfect (le plus-que-parfait; the perfect of the imperfect), or sometimes a new form called the surcomposé (literally, "over-compound"), which re-applies the perfect to the compound past, resulting in a structure like « Je l'ai eu fait » (literally, "I it have had done").
Unlike English or Spanish
, French does not mark for a continuous aspect. Thus, "I am doing it" (continuous) and "I do it" both translate to the same sentence in French: « Je le fais. » However, the distinction is often clear from context; and when not, it can be conveyed using periphrasis
; for example, the expression être en train de[faire quelque chose] ("to be in the middle of [doing something] ") is often used to convey the sense of a continuous aspect. (For example, "I am doing it" might be expressed as « Je suis en train de le faire », "I am in the middle of doing it.") In the case of the past tense, neither the simple nor the compound past tense is ever used with a continuous sense; therefore, the imperfect often indicates a continuous sense (though it does have other uses, as discussed above).
Similarly to English, the verb aller (to go) can be used as an auxiliary verb to create a near-future tense (le futur proche). Whereas English uses the continuous aspect (to be going), French uses the simple present tense; for example, the English sentence "I am going to do it tomorrow" would in French be « Je vais le faire demain » (literally, "I go it to do tomorrow"). As in English, this form can generally be replaced by the present or future tense: "I am doing it tomorrow", "I shall do it tomorrow", « Je le fais demain », « Je le ferai demain ».
As with the indicative, the subjunctive also has one compound tense form for each simple tense form. The difference between the present perfect subjunctive (le passé du subjonctif) and the pluperfect subjunctive (le plus-que-parfait du subjonctif) is analogous to the difference between the present subjunctive and imperfect subjunctive; of the two, only the present perfect subjunctive is found in modern French.
But also, unlike in English, the subjunctive is used in, for example,
Sometimes the subjunctive is used in the interrogative and the negative but not in the affirmative:
In addition to situations of doubt, negatives stated with certainty take the subjunctive:
Superlatives also can optionally be accompanied by the subjunctive in a que clause, if the speaker feels doubt:
Finally, as in English, counterfactual conditions in the past are expressed by backshifting the apparent time reference. In English this backshifted form is called the pluperfect subjunctive, and unless it is expresseed in inverted form it is identical in form to the pluperfect indicative; it is called subjunctive because of the change in implied time of action. In French, however, there is a distinction in form between the seldom used pluperfect subjunctive and the pluperfect indicative, which is used in this situation. For example,
The imperative only has a present tense, with a rarely-used perfect: "fais-le" and "aie-le fait" both mean "do it", with the latter implying a certain deadline (somewhat like English "have it done").
s and a number of verbs of motion or change of state, including some of the most frequently used intransitive verbs of the language:
Verbs that are derived from these by prefixation may continue to select être, but this is not always the case. For example:
(The verbs marked with "¹" above combine with être in their intransitive uses, and avoir when used transitively.)
A small number of verbs, including some already mentioned above, can in fact be found with either auxiliary (croître, monter, descendre, convenir, paraître, apparaître, trépasser). There may be a subtle change of meaning depending on the auxiliary chosen, and one auxiliary is usually more literary or archaic than the other.
The distinction between the two auxiliary verbs is important for the correct formation of the compound tense-aspect forms and is essential to the agreement of the past participle.
In compound tense-aspect forms, more complicated agreement rules apply.
A. The auxiliary verb is avoir.
B. The auxiliary is être, and the verb is not reflexive. The past participle agrees with the subject:
C. The auxiliary is être and the verb is reflexive. The agreement rules are in fact the same as those for structures with avoir in A, keeping in mind that the reflexive pronoun corresponds to either the direct object or the indirect object of the verb.
French language
French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...
verb
Verb
A verb, from the Latin verbum meaning word, is a word that in syntax conveys an action , or a state of being . In the usual description of English, the basic form, with or without the particle to, is the infinitive...
s are a part of speech in French grammar
French grammar
French grammar is the grammar of the French language, which is similar to that of the other Romance languages.French is a moderately inflected language...
. Each verb lexeme
Lexeme
A lexeme is an abstract unit of morphological analysis in linguistics, that roughly corresponds to a set of forms taken by a single word. For example, in the English language, run, runs, ran and running are forms of the same lexeme, conventionally written as RUN...
has a collection of finite and non-finite forms in its conjugation
Grammatical conjugation
In linguistics, conjugation is the creation of derived forms of a verb from its principal parts by inflection . Conjugation may be affected by person, number, gender, tense, aspect, mood, voice, or other grammatical categories...
scheme.
Finite forms depend on grammatical tense
Grammatical tense
A tense is a grammatical category that locates a situation in time, to indicate when the situation takes place.Bernard Comrie, Aspect, 1976:6:...
and person
Grammatical person
Grammatical person, in linguistics, is deictic reference to a participant in an event; such as the speaker, the addressee, or others. Grammatical person typically defines a language's set of personal pronouns...
/number. There are eight simple tense–aspect–mood forms, categorized into the indicative, subjunctive
Subjunctive mood
In grammar, the subjunctive mood is a verb mood typically used in subordinate clauses to express various states of irreality such as wish, emotion, possibility, judgment, opinion, necessity, or action that has not yet occurred....
and imperative
Imperative mood
The imperative mood expresses commands or requests as a grammatical mood. These commands or requests urge the audience to act a certain way. It also may signal a prohibition, permission, or any other kind of exhortation.- Morphology :...
mood
Grammatical mood
In linguistics, grammatical mood is a grammatical feature of verbs, used to signal modality. That is, it is the use of verbal inflections that allow speakers to express their attitude toward what they are saying...
s, with the conditional mood
Conditional mood
In linguistics, the conditional mood is the inflectional form of the verb used in the independent clause of a conditional sentence to refer to a hypothetical state of affairs, or an uncertain event, that is contingent on another set of circumstances...
sometimes viewed as an additional category. The eight simple forms can also be categorized into four tenses (future, present, past, and future-of-the-past), or into two aspects
Grammatical aspect
In linguistics, the grammatical aspect of a verb is a grammatical category that defines the temporal flow in a given action, event, or state, from the point of view of the speaker...
(perfective
Perfective aspect
The perfective aspect , sometimes called the aoristic aspect, is a grammatical aspect used to describe a situation viewed as a simple whole, whether that situation occurs in the past, present, or future. The perfective aspect is equivalent to the aspectual component of past perfective forms...
and imperfective
Imperfective aspect
The imperfective is a grammatical aspect used to describe a situation viewed with internal structure, such as ongoing, habitual, repeated, and similar semantic roles, whether that situation occurs in the past, present, or future...
).
The three non-finite moods are the infinitive
Infinitive
In grammar, infinitive is the name for certain verb forms that exist in many languages. In the usual description of English, the infinitive of a verb is its basic form with or without the particle to: therefore, do and to do, be and to be, and so on are infinitives...
, past participle, and present participle.
There are also compound constructions that use more than verb. These include one for each simple tense with the addition of "avoir" or "être" as an auxiliary verb. There is also a construction which is used to distinguish passive voice from active voice.
Conjugation
French verbs are conjugatedGrammatical conjugation
In linguistics, conjugation is the creation of derived forms of a verb from its principal parts by inflection . Conjugation may be affected by person, number, gender, tense, aspect, mood, voice, or other grammatical categories...
by isolating the stem of the verb and adding an ending. In the first and second conjugation, the stem is easily identifiable from the infinitive
Infinitive
In grammar, infinitive is the name for certain verb forms that exist in many languages. In the usual description of English, the infinitive of a verb is its basic form with or without the particle to: therefore, do and to do, be and to be, and so on are infinitives...
, and remains essentially constant throughout the paradigm. For example, the stem of parler ("speak") is parl- and the stem of finir ("finish") is fin-. In the third group, the relationship between the infinitive form and the stem is less consistent, and several distinct stems are needed to produce all the forms in the paradigm. For example, the verb boire ("drink") has the stems boi-, boiv-, bu-, and buv-.
The ending depends on the mood
Grammatical mood
In linguistics, grammatical mood is a grammatical feature of verbs, used to signal modality. That is, it is the use of verbal inflections that allow speakers to express their attitude toward what they are saying...
, tense
Grammatical tense
A tense is a grammatical category that locates a situation in time, to indicate when the situation takes place.Bernard Comrie, Aspect, 1976:6:...
, aspect
Aspect
Aspect may be:*Aspect , a feature that is linked to many parts of a program, but which is not necessarily the primary function of the program...
, and voice of the verb, as well as on the person
Grammatical person
Grammatical person, in linguistics, is deictic reference to a participant in an event; such as the speaker, the addressee, or others. Grammatical person typically defines a language's set of personal pronouns...
and number
Grammatical number
In linguistics, grammatical number is a grammatical category of nouns, pronouns, and adjective and verb agreement that expresses count distinctions ....
of its subject
Subject (grammar)
The subject is one of the two main constituents of a clause, according to a tradition that can be tracked back to Aristotle and that is associated with phrase structure grammars; the other constituent is the predicate. According to another tradition, i.e...
. Every conjugation exhibits some degree of syncretism
Syncretism (linguistics)
In linguistics, syncretism is the identity of form of distinct morphological forms of a word. This phenomenon is typical of fusional languages....
, where the same (homophonous, and possibly also homographic) form is used to realize distinct combinations of grammatical features. This is most noticeable for -er verbs. For instance, the conjugated form parle can be the 1st or 3rd person singular indicative or subjunctive form of parler, or the singular familiar imperative. Furthermore, the 2nd person singular indicative and subjunctive form parles and the 3rd person plural form parlent are pronounced the same way as parle (except in liaison
Liaison (linguistics)
Liaison is the pronunciation of a latent word-final consonant immediately before a following vowel sound. In French, most written word-final consonants are no longer pronounced and are known as latent or mute...
contexts). The prevalence of syncretism in conjugation paradigms is one functional explanation for the fact that French does not allow null subjects
Null subject language
In linguistic typology, a null-subject language is a language whose grammar permits an independent clause to lack an explicit subject. Such a clause is then said to have a null subject. Typically, null subject languages express person, number, and/or gender agreement with the referent on the verb,...
, unlike most of the other Romance languages.
Classification
Aside from être and avoir (considered categories unto themselves), French verbs are traditionally grouped into three conjugation classes (groupes):- The first conjugation class consists of all verbs with infinitives ending in -er, except for the irregular verb aller and (by some accounts) the irregular verbs envoyer and renvoyer; the verbs in this conjugation, which together constitute the great majority of French verbs, are all conjugated similarly, though there are a number of subclasses with minor changes arising from orthographical and phonological considerations.
- The second conjugation class consists of all verbs with infinitives in -ir or -ïr and present participles in -issant or -ïssant, as well as the verb maudire. There are somewhat over 300 such verbs, all conjugated identically, with some minor exceptions. The -iss- or -ïss- in much of their conjugation is a reflex of the Latin inchoativeInchoativeInchoative aspect is a grammatical aspect, referring to the beginning of an action or state. It can be found in conservative Indo-European languages such as Latin and Lithuanian, and also in Finnic languages. It should not be confused with the prospective, which denotes actions that are about to...
infix -isc-/-esc-, but does not retain any aspectualGrammatical aspectIn linguistics, the grammatical aspect of a verb is a grammatical category that defines the temporal flow in a given action, event, or state, from the point of view of the speaker...
semantics. - The third conjugation class consists of all other verbs: aller, arguably (r)envoyer, a number of verbs in -ir (including all verbs in -oir, which is an etymologically unrelated ending), and all verbs in -re. Nonetheless, this class is very small compared to the other two, though it does contain some of the most common verbs. This class has a few dozen subclasses, often differing substantially; indeed, this class is essentially a catch-all for verbs, besides être and avoir, that do not fit into the first two classes. There are about 370 verbs in this group, though a much smaller number are still in frequent use.
Moods
As with English verbs, French verbs have both non-finiteNon-finite verb
In linguistics, a non-finite verb is a verb form that is not limited by a subject and, more generally, is not fully inflected by categories that are marked inflectionally in language, such as tense, aspect, mood, number, gender, and person...
moods (les modes impersonnels), also called verbals, and finite
Finite verb
A finite verb is a verb that is inflected for person and for tense according to the rules and categories of the languages in which it occurs. Finite verbs can form independent clauses, which can stand on their own as complete sentences....
ones (les modes personnels).
Finite moods
The finite moods are the indicative (l'indicatif), the imperative (l'impératif), and the subjunctiveSubjunctive mood
In grammar, the subjunctive mood is a verb mood typically used in subordinate clauses to express various states of irreality such as wish, emotion, possibility, judgment, opinion, necessity, or action that has not yet occurred....
(le subjonctif). As discussed below, sometimes the conditional is recognized as a fourth mood. While the rules that determine the correct mood are quite complex, they are simplified and summarized in the following table:
| indicative |
|
|
|---|---|---|
| subjunctive |
|
|
| imperative |
|
|
Many linguists recognize a fourth mood, the conditional
Conditional mood
In linguistics, the conditional mood is the inflectional form of the verb used in the independent clause of a conditional sentence to refer to a hypothetical state of affairs, or an uncertain event, that is contingent on another set of circumstances...
(le conditionnel), which is used in almost exactly the same circumstances as the conditional in English. In French, « Je le ferais si j'avais assez de temps » is "I would do it if I had enough time" in English. Other linguists consider the conditional to be a tense of the indicative mood. The two camps do not disagree on the rules for when and how to use the conditional. A third camp recognizes both "conditionnel présent / conditionnel passé" (for use in conditional sentences), and "indicatif futur du passé / indicatif futur antérieur du passé" (for tense concords, "future from a past point-of-view"), but they recognize also that both are conjugated the same.
Non-finite moods
- The infinitive has a present tense, with a perfect: "faire" means "to do," while "avoir fait" means "to have done."
- There is a present participleParticipleIn linguistics, a participle is a word that shares some characteristics of both verbs and adjectives. It can be used in compound verb tenses or voices , or as a modifier...
, with a perfect construction: "faisant" means "doing," while "ayant fait" means "having done." As noted above, this participle is not used in forming a continuous aspect. Further, it cannot be used as a noun, in the way that present participles in English have the same form as gerundGerundIn linguistics* As applied to English, it refers to the usage of a verb as a noun ....
s; the only noun verbal is the infinitive. - There is a gérondif ("gerundive", but different from the Latin gerundive), formed with the cliticCliticIn morphology and syntax, a clitic is a morpheme that is grammatically independent, but phonologically dependent on another word or phrase. It is pronounced like an affix, but works at the phrase level...
en and the present participle: "en faisant" means "by doing" or "while doing." (It is analogous to the English "in doing," but in English, since "doing" can act as a noun, "in doing" is taken as a prepositional phrase rather than as a separate verb form. That interpretation is not available for "en faisant.") Similarly, "en ayant fait" means "by having done." - There is a separate past participle: "fait" means "done." As in English, it can be used in the passive voice, in the perfect form, or on its own as an adjective. The past participle has no perfect, except arguably in the special surcomposé tense.
Tenses and aspects of the indicative mood
The indicative mood has five "simple" (syntheticSynthetic language
In linguistic typology, a synthetic language is a language with a high morpheme-per-word ratio, as opposed to a low morpheme-per-word ratio in what is described as an isolating language...
) tense-aspect forms, conveying four tenses (times of action) (future, present, past, and future-of-past) and two aspects (fabrics of time) (perfective
Perfective aspect
The perfective aspect , sometimes called the aoristic aspect, is a grammatical aspect used to describe a situation viewed as a simple whole, whether that situation occurs in the past, present, or future. The perfective aspect is equivalent to the aspectual component of past perfective forms...
, conveying an action viewed in its entirety without its time frame being considered in more detail, and imperfective
Imperfective aspect
The imperfective is a grammatical aspect used to describe a situation viewed with internal structure, such as ongoing, habitual, repeated, and similar semantic roles, whether that situation occurs in the past, present, or future...
, conveying an action that occurs repetitively or continuously). The tense-aspect forms of the indicative mood in French are called the present (le présent: present tense, imperfective aspect), the simple past (le passé simple
Passé simple
The passé simple , also called the passé défini , is the literary equivalent of the passé composé in the French language, used only in formal writing , journalism, and formal speech. As with other preterites, it is used when the action has a definite beginning and end and has already been completed...
: past tense, perfective aspect), the imperfect (l'imparfait: past tense, imperfective aspect), the future (le futur: future tense, unspecified aspect), and the conditional (le conditionnel: future-in-past tense, unspecified aspect). Note that, as discussed above, in some uses the conditional can be considered a separate mood completely, while in other uses it is the future-in-past tense of the indicative. The use of the various tense forms is described in the following table:
| present |
|
|
|---|---|---|
| simple past (past perfective) |
Perfective aspect The perfective aspect , sometimes called the aoristic aspect, is a grammatical aspect used to describe a situation viewed as a simple whole, whether that situation occurs in the past, present, or future. The perfective aspect is equivalent to the aspectual component of past perfective forms... or aorist aspect; that is, with a sense of completion, with a definite beginning and end |
|
| imperfect (past imperfective) |
Imperfective aspect The imperfective is a grammatical aspect used to describe a situation viewed with internal structure, such as ongoing, habitual, repeated, and similar semantic roles, whether that situation occurs in the past, present, or future... ; that is, ongoing, repetitive, or habitual past events or situations |
|
| simple future |
|
|
| conditional (future-in-past) |
|
|
Additionally, the indicative has five compound (two-word) tense-aspect forms, each of which is formed analogously to the perfect in languages such as English (e.g., "have done") (though in French this form does not indicate the perfect aspect) as applied to one of the above simple tense forms. These tense forms are used to indicate events before the corresponding simple tense forms; for example, « À ce moment-là, il se souvint de ce qu'il avait promis » ("At that moment, he remembered what he had promised"). In addition, except in literature or very formal speeches, the present perfect form is used in modern French wherever the simple past would have been used in older or more literary writing. Since this use is much more common than its use as a true present perfect, it is usually called the compound past (le passé composé
Passé composé
Passé composé is the most commonly used past tense in the modern French language. It is used to express an action that has been completed at the time of speech, or at some time in the past...
). Further, where older or more literary French would have used the perfect form of the simple past tense (le passé antérieur) for the past-of-the-past, modern non-literary French uses the pluperfect (le plus-que-parfait; the perfect of the imperfect), or sometimes a new form called the surcomposé (literally, "over-compound"), which re-applies the perfect to the compound past, resulting in a structure like « Je l'ai eu fait » (literally, "I it have had done").
Unlike English or Spanish
Spanish language
Spanish , also known as Castilian , is a Romance language in the Ibero-Romance group that evolved from several languages and dialects in central-northern Iberia around the 9th century and gradually spread with the expansion of the Kingdom of Castile into central and southern Iberia during the...
, French does not mark for a continuous aspect. Thus, "I am doing it" (continuous) and "I do it" both translate to the same sentence in French: « Je le fais. » However, the distinction is often clear from context; and when not, it can be conveyed using periphrasis
Periphrasis
In linguistics, periphrasis is a device by which a grammatical category or grammatical relationship is expressed by a free morpheme , instead of being shown by inflection or derivation...
; for example, the expression être en train de
Similarly to English, the verb aller (to go) can be used as an auxiliary verb to create a near-future tense (le futur proche). Whereas English uses the continuous aspect (to be going), French uses the simple present tense; for example, the English sentence "I am going to do it tomorrow" would in French be « Je vais le faire demain » (literally, "I go it to do tomorrow"). As in English, this form can generally be replaced by the present or future tense: "I am doing it tomorrow", "I shall do it tomorrow", « Je le fais demain », « Je le ferai demain ».
Forms
The subjunctive mood has only two simple tense-aspect forms: a present (le présent du subjonctif) and an imperfect (l'imparfait du subjonctif). Of these, only the present is used nowadays; like the simple past indicative, the imperfect subjunctive is only found in older and more literary works. When both tense-aspect forms are used, there is no difference in meaning between the two; the present is used in subordinate clauses whose main clauses are in a present or future tense, as well as in the few main clauses that use the subjunctive, and the imperfect is used in subordinate clauses whose main clauses are in a past tense form (other than present perfect). Except in literature and very formal speeches, modern French uses the present subjunctive even where an older or more literary work would use the imperfect subjunctive.As with the indicative, the subjunctive also has one compound tense form for each simple tense form. The difference between the present perfect subjunctive (le passé du subjonctif) and the pluperfect subjunctive (le plus-que-parfait du subjonctif) is analogous to the difference between the present subjunctive and imperfect subjunctive; of the two, only the present perfect subjunctive is found in modern French.
Uses
The subjunctive in French is used almost wherever it would be in English, and in many other situations as well. It is used in que ("that") clauses to indicate emotion, doubt, possibility, necessity, desire, and so forth. For example, as in English one says- J'aime mieux qu'il le fasse, "I prefer that he it do", "I prefer that he do it"
But also, unlike in English, the subjunctive is used in, for example,
- Je veux qu'il le fasses "I want that he it do", "I want him to do it"
- Je crains qu'il ne parte "I fear that he (subjunctive particle) leave", "I am afraid that he will leave"
- Je cherche un homme qui sache la vérité "I seek a man who know the truth", "I am looking for a man who knows the truth"
Sometimes the subjunctive is used in the interrogative and the negative but not in the affirmative:
- Penses-tu qu'il soit sympa? (subjunctive) "Do you think that he is nice?"
- Oui, je pense qu'il est sympa. (indicative) "Yes, I think that he is nice"
- Non, je ne pense pas qu'il soit sympa. (subjunctive) "No, I do not think that he is nice."
In addition to situations of doubt, negatives stated with certainty take the subjunctive:
- Il n'y a rien que nous puissions faire. "There is nothing that we can do."
Superlatives also can optionally be accompanied by the subjunctive in a que clause, if the speaker feels doubt:
- C'est le meilleur livre que j'aie pu trouver. "That is the best book that I could find."
Finally, as in English, counterfactual conditions in the past are expressed by backshifting the apparent time reference. In English this backshifted form is called the pluperfect subjunctive, and unless it is expresseed in inverted form it is identical in form to the pluperfect indicative; it is called subjunctive because of the change in implied time of action. In French, however, there is a distinction in form between the seldom used pluperfect subjunctive and the pluperfect indicative, which is used in this situation. For example,
- Si on l'avait su (pluperfect indicative), on aurait pu (conditional perfect) l'empêcher. "Had we known (pluperfect subjunctive) it, we would have been able (conditional perfect) to prevent it.
Tenses and aspects of the imperative mood
| imperative |
|
« Fais-le. » ("Do it.") |
|---|
The imperative only has a present tense, with a rarely-used perfect: "fais-le" and "aie-le fait" both mean "do it", with the latter implying a certain deadline (somewhat like English "have it done").
Voice
Like English, French has two voices, the unmarked active voice and the marked passive voice. As in English, the passive voice is formed by using the appropriate form of "to be" (être) and the past participle of the main verb.Temporal auxiliary verbs
In French, all compound tense-aspect forms are formed with an auxiliary verb (either être "to be" or avoir "to have"). Most verbs use avoir as their auxiliary verb. The exceptions are all reflexive verbReflexive verb
In grammar, a reflexive verb is a verb whose semantic agent and patient are the same. For example, the English verb to perjure is reflexive, since one can only perjure oneself...
s and a number of verbs of motion or change of state, including some of the most frequently used intransitive verbs of the language:
- aller — to go
- arriver — to arrive
- décéder — to pass away
- descendre¹ — to descend
- devenir — to become
- entrer¹ — to enter
- monter¹ — to climb/mount
- mourir — to die
- naître — to be born
- partir — to leave or part
- passer¹ — to pass by
- rester — to stay
- retourner¹ — to return
- sortir¹ — to go out
- tomber¹ — to fall
- venir — to come
Verbs that are derived from these by prefixation may continue to select être, but this is not always the case. For example:
- (with être)
- derived from venir: advenir, intervenir, parvenir, provenir, survenir
- prefix re-: redevenir, remonter¹, renaître, rentrer¹, ressortir¹, revenir, etc.
- (with 'avoir')
- derived from venir: circonvenir, contrevenir, convenir, prévenir, subvenir
- transitive verbs: démonter, surmonter, dépasser, outrepasser, surpasser, etc.
(The verbs marked with "¹" above combine with être in their intransitive uses, and avoir when used transitively.)
A small number of verbs, including some already mentioned above, can in fact be found with either auxiliary (croître, monter, descendre, convenir, paraître, apparaître, trépasser). There may be a subtle change of meaning depending on the auxiliary chosen, and one auxiliary is usually more literary or archaic than the other.
The distinction between the two auxiliary verbs is important for the correct formation of the compound tense-aspect forms and is essential to the agreement of the past participle.
Past participle agreement
The past participle is used in three ways in French: as an adjective, in the passive construction, and in the compound tense-aspect constructions. When it is used as an adjective, it follows all the regular adjective agreement rules. In passive constructions, it always agrees with the passive subject.In compound tense-aspect forms, more complicated agreement rules apply.
A. The auxiliary verb is avoir.
- If there is no direct object (the verb is intransitive) or the direct object appears after the past participle, then the past participle does not agree (i.e., it takes the default masculine singular form).
- (intransitive) Elles ont dormi. ("They (fem.) slept.")
- (direct object after verb) Claire a vu deux baleines. ("Claire saw two whales.")
- (intransitive) Elles ont dormi. ("They (fem.) slept.")
- If there is a direct object and it appears before the past participle, then the participle must agree with it. Three cases:
- (pronoun before the auxiliary) Il y avait deux baleines. Claire les a vues. ("There were two whales. Claire saw them.")
- (clause-initial wh-question element) Quelles baleines Claire a-t-elle vues ? ("Which whales did Claire see?")
- (relative clause introduced by que) les deux baleines que Claire a vues ("the two whales that Claire saw")
- (pronoun before the auxiliary) Il y avait deux baleines. Claire les a vues. ("There were two whales. Claire saw them.")
- The above rules apply in writing only. In speech, the past participle of a verb conjugated with avoir is nearly always invariable. (For the vast majority of verbs, this would be the case anyway. For example, vu vus vue vues "seen" are all pronounced /vy/. However, this applies also to past participles like fait "done" and mis "put" whose feminine forms sound different in speech.)
B. The auxiliary is être, and the verb is not reflexive. The past participle agrees with the subject:
-
- Elles sont arrivées. ("They (fem.) arrived.")
C. The auxiliary is être and the verb is reflexive. The agreement rules are in fact the same as those for structures with avoir in A, keeping in mind that the reflexive pronoun corresponds to either the direct object or the indirect object of the verb.
- There is no direct object, or the direct object appears after the past participle → no agreement. In these cases, the reflexive pronoun expresses the indirect object.
- (no direct object) Elles se sont succédé. Nous nous sommes parlé. ("They (fem.) succeeded. We spoke with each other.")
- (direct object after verb) Elles se sont posé des questions. ("They (fem.) asked each other some questions.")
- (no direct object) Elles se sont succédé. Nous nous sommes parlé. ("They (fem.) succeeded. We spoke with each other.")
- There is a direct object and it appears before the past participle. → The past participle agrees with this object.
The first three cases are the same as in A.2 above (the reflexive pronoun is the indirect object).
- (direct object pronoun) J'ai fait une tarte. Les enfants se la sont partagée. ("I made a pie. The children shared it.")
- (wh-question) Quelle tarte se sont-ils partagée ? ("Which pie did they share?")
- (que relative) la tarte que les enfants se sont partagée ("the pie that the children shared")
The reflexive pronoun can itself be the direct object, in which case the participle agrees with it (and therefore with the subject). This also includes "inherently reflexive" verbs, for which the reflexive pronoun cannot be interpreted semantically as an object (direct or indirect) of the verb.
- (ordinary reflexive) Elles se sont suivies. Nous nous sommes salués. ("They (fem.) followed each other. We greeted each other.")
- (inherently reflexive) Ils se sont moqués de moi. Nous nous sommes souvenus de l'événement.
("They made fun of me. We remembered the event.")
(exception: Elles se sont ri du danger. "They (fem.) laughed at the danger.")
- (direct object pronoun) J'ai fait une tarte. Les enfants se la sont partagée. ("I made a pie. The children shared it.")
External links
- A Two-Page PDF Reference Guide of the 681 Most Common French/English Verbs
- Le Conjugueur - online conjugation for all French verbs
- Bescherelle - Reference book for French Conjugation
- A simple page for online conjugation
- French verb conjugation and translation (English-French)
- More 12000 French verbs conjugation
- Online French verb conjugation Free online French verb conjugation
- Vatefaireconjuguer.com online conjugator for French verbs