Cân Chinh Truong PRACTICE MAKES PERFECT Complete French Grammar This page intentionally left blank PRACTICE MAKES PERFECT Complete French Grammar Annie Heminway New York Chicago San Francisco Lisbon London Madrid Mexico City Milan New Delhi San Juan Seoul Singapore Sydney Toronto Copyright © 2008 by Annie Heminway. All rights reserved. Manufactured in the United States of America. Except as permitted under the United States Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced or distributed in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval sys- tem, without the prior written permission of the publisher. 0-07-159435-3 The material in this eBook also appears in the print version of this title: 0-07-148284-9. All trademarks are trademarks of their respective owners. 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Professional Want to learn more? v Contents Introduction ix 1 The present tense of regular -er verbs 1 Regular -er verbs in the present 1 -er verbs with spelling and stem changes 4 When is the present tense used in French? 9 2 The present tense of -ir and -re verbs 13 -ir verbs in the present 13 -re verbs in the present 16 The interrogative form 19 The negative form 21 3 To be and to have 24 The verb être (to be) 24 The verb avoir (to have) 26 The -oir verbs 28 4 More irregular verbs 34 The verb aller (to go) 34 The immediate future tense 35 The verb venir (to come) 36 The immediate past 37 The verb faire (to do, to make) 40 The causative form 41 5 Devoir and its many facets 43 The verb devoir (to have to, must) 43 Il y a (there is, there are) 46 Il s’agit de (it is a matter of, it’s about) 46 Verbs ending in -eindre and -aindre 46 For more information about this title, click here vi Contents 6 Pronominal verbs 49 Refl exive verbs 49 Reciprocal verbs 50 Passive pronominals 51 Subjective pronominals 51 Pronominals in the imperative and the infi nitive 52 7 The passé composé 55 The past participle of regular verbs 55 The passé composé with avoir 56 Irregular past participles 58 The passé composé with être 60 Pronominal verbs in the passé composé 62 Verbs conjugated with avoir and être 63 8 The imparfait 65 The imparfait 65 The imparfait versus the passé composé 67 The imparfait with special constructions 70 9 The futur simple and the futur antérieur 72 The futur simple 72 The futur antérieur 77 Conjunctions used with the indicative mood 79 10 The plus-que-parfait 81 Formation of the plus-que-parfait 81 Use of the plus-que-parfait 83 11 The present conditional and the past conditional 87 The present conditional 87 The past conditional 92 12 Could, should, would? 97 Could 97 Should 99 Would 100 13 The present subjunctive and the past subjunctive 104 The present subjunctive 104 Uses of the subjunctive 106 The past subjunctive 112 Contents vii 14 The infi nitive mood 115 The infi nitif présent 115 The infi nitif passé 118 Verbs with their prepositions 120 15 The present participle and the gerund 126 The present participle 126 The gerund 129 16 The passé simple 131 Formation of the passé simple 131 The passé simple of irregular verbs 132 17 The passive voice 136 Formation of the passive voice 136 Uses of the passive voice 139 Avoiding the passive voice in French 139 18 Indirect speech 141 Direct speech versus indirect speech 141 Balancing tenses: la concordance des temps 142 19 The imperative mood 147 Formation of the imperative 147 The imperative of pronominal verbs 150 20 Articles and nouns 152 The defi nite article with nouns 152 The indefi nite and partitive articles with nouns 153 The gender of nouns 155 The plural of nouns 158 The gender of countries 160 Geographical names with prepositions 161 21 All the pronouns 166 Subject pronouns 166 Direct object pronouns 167 Indirect object pronouns 170 The order of object pronouns 176 Disjunctive pronouns 178 22 Adjectives and comparisons 183 Agreement of adjectives 183 The placement of adjectives 184 viii Contents Adjectives of color 185 Comparatives and superlatives 187 23 Demonstrative adjectives and pronouns 191 Demonstrative adjectives 191 Possessive adjectives 193 Possessive pronouns 195 Demonstrative pronouns 198 24 Relative pronouns 202 Qui 202 Que 203 Lequel 205 Où 206 Dont 207 Ce que, ce qui, ce dont, ce à quoi 209 25 Adverbs and expressions of time, frequency, and location 212 Adverbs and expressions of time 212 Interrogative forms; question words 219 Adverbs and expressions of location 219 26 Numbers 221 The numbers 0 to 50 221 Ordinal numbers 222 The numbers 50 to 99 224 The numbers 100 to 999 225 The numbers 1,000 and greater 227 27 Pot pourri 230 Verbs that use different prepositions 230 Whatever, whenever, wherever, whoever 233 Avoir beau and quitte à 234 Verb tables 236 Regular verbs 236 Verbs with spelling changes 238 Verbs with stem changes 238 Irregular verbs 239 French-English glossary 240 English-French glossary 250 Answer key 260 [...]... infinitive follow the same conjugation The pattern is easy You remove the -er ending of the verb to get the root: parler (to speak) Ǟ parl- Then, you add the endings corresponding to the subject pronoun The endings for the -er regular verbs are: -e, -es, -e, -ons, -ez, -ent The -e, -es, and -ent endings of the verbs are all silent The final -s of nous, vous, ils, elles links with verbs beginning with a vowel... regardez-vous cette émission? (des années) 7 Depuis quand travaille-t-il dans cette entreprise? (2002) 8 Depuis combien de temps portez-vous des lunettes? (dix ans) 9 Depuis quand est-il président? (2005) 10 Depuis combien de temps ce magasin est-il fermé? (deux mois) The present tense of regular -er verbs 11 EXERCICE 1 10 Traduire les phrases suivantes en utilisant vous et l’inversion si nécessaire 1 I... dictionary for five years EXERCICE 1 9 Répondre aux questions en utilisant le présent et depuis 1 Depuis combien de temps chante-t-elle dans cette chorale? (trois ans) 2 Depuis combien de temps partages-tu cet appartement? (six mois) 3 Depuis combien de temps nage-t-il dans cette piscine? (un mois) 4 Depuis quand habitez-vous à Montpellier? (2004) 5 Depuis combien de temps possède-t-il cette propriété? (dix... I study French 2 I spell my name 3 They are moving tomorrow 4 She likes to travel by boat 5 How long have you been studying French? 6 You repeat the sentence (informal) 7 We are financing the project 8 She cancels the meeting 9 How long have you been living in this house? 10 I weigh the vegetables 12 practice makes perfect Complete French Grammar The present tense of -ir and -re verbs ·2· -ir verbs... (menacer) de partir Verbs ending in -ger With verbs ending in -ger, such as voyager (to travel), the -g- becomes -ge- before the letter o je voyage tu voyages il/elle voyage I travel you travel he/she travels nous voyageons vous voyagez ils/elles voyagent we travel you travel they travel Here are other common -ger verbs: nous bougeons nous changeons we move we change The present tense of regular -er verbs... to time sometimes -er verbs with spelling and stem changes Some -er verbs, otherwise regular, show spelling or stem changes in the present tense, largely to maintain pronunciation These can be learned according to their groups Verbs ending in -cer Some spelling changes occur with some -er regular verbs With verbs ending in -cer, such as prononcer (to pronounce) the -c- becomes - - before the letter... j’emmène j’enlève je lève I complete I take along, I escort I remove I raise practice makes perfect Complete French Grammar we buy you buy they buy mener peser semer je mène je pèse je sème I lead I weigh I sow With some verbs composed of - ϩ consonant ϩ -er, such as répéter (to repeat), changes may also occur The é aigu changes to an è grave in all but the first- and second-person plural je répète tu... preposition to: to say, to wear Infinitives in French are not preceded by an equivalent of the preposition to They are identified according to groups by their endings: -er, -ir, -re, -oir Regular -er verbs in the present Let’s start with the infinitives of verbs of the first group, ending in -er, such as regarder (to look at) and chanter (to sing) Most verbs that end in -er in the infinitive follow the same... perfect Complete French Grammar The present tense of -ir and -re verbs ·2· -ir verbs in the present We studied the -er verbs in the first chapter Now, let’s explore the -ir and -re verbs The -ir verbs follow two different conjugation patterns Type 1 verbs drop the -ir of the infinitive, add an -iss- to the plural form, and then insert the appropriate ending choisir to choose je choisis tu choisis il/elle... they already know as they continue to advance their knowledge of French ix Copyright © 2008 by Annie Heminway Click here for terms of use This page intentionally left blank PRACTICE MAKES PERFEC T Complete French Grammar This page intentionally left blank The present tense of regular -er verbs 1 Before studying the present tense in French, you need to be familiar with the grammatical terms in chapters . subjunctive 11 2 Contents vii 14 The infi nitive mood 11 5 The infi nitif présent 11 5 The infi nitif passé 11 8 Verbs with their prepositions 12 0 15 The present participle and the gerund 12 6 The present participle. 77 Conjunctions used with the indicative mood 79 10 The plus-que-parfait 81 Formation of the plus-que-parfait 81 Use of the plus-que-parfait 83 11 The present conditional and the past conditional. participle 12 6 The gerund 12 9 16 The passé simple 13 1 Formation of the passé simple 13 1 The passé simple of irregular verbs 13 2 17 The passive voice 13 6 Formation of the passive voice 13 6 Uses