In today’s lesson, we are going to learn about using the imperfect (imparfait) tense in French. You will also learn:
• What the imperfect tense is
• How to form this tense
• A list of verbs conjugated in the imperfect tense
Once you can express yourself in the imperfect tense and know some good adjectives and vocabulary words, you will be able to express your thoughts about a movie you have seen, or anything else that you fancy talking about, making you a lot better at conversing in French.
The imperfect tense is another way to talk about something that has happened in the past. It usually translates as “was,” i.e. “the weather was nice.” It also is used when describing an event where the start and end are not specified, e.g. “I liked the bit when the woman fell over in the film.”
The imperfect tense often plays a complementary role to the perfect tense (passé composé).
In order to conjugate a verb in the imperfect tense, you need to take the first person plural pronoun “nous,” which means “we,” and change the ending of the verb to suit the subject as the root form (For example: Nous prenons/ Nous sortons). You remove –ons and then add one of the following: –ais, –ais, –ait, -ions, –iez, or –aient depending on the subject. See an example below.
Example:
Listen to Week 4 Day 1 Track 1
• je sortais
• tu sortais
• il/elle sortait
• nous sortions
• vous sortiez
• ils/elles sortaient
The only verb that has an irregular stem for the imperfect tense is être:
Speaking Practice 1
Listen to Week 4 Day 1 Track 2
• J’étais, tu étais…
While the perfect tense is used to talk about a specific action in a specific time in the past, the imperfect tense is used to describe the situation (the framework) of this action.
• J’étais à la maison quand il est venu.
I was at home when he came.
(situation) (action)
The imperfect tense is also used to talk about a habit in the past.
• Il jouait au tennis le Mardi (mais il a arrêté depuis).
He used to play tennis on Tuesdays (but now he has stopped).
Dialogue:
Responses