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L’imparfait (the imperfect) is a French past tense. It describes states and actions that were ongoing or repeated in the past. The imperfect can correspond to the English simple past tense, but also to structures such as used to and would. The imperfect is used to tell stories and report on past actions, mostly in written contexts.
In grammatical terms, "perfect" means "complete," so the French imperfect tense is used to describe an incomplete or ongoing action or state of being. The imparfait is usually equivalent to "was" or "was ___-ing" in English ( past progressive) and is used for all of the following:
Sep 12, 2012 · The French imperfect tense is used to describe states of being and habitual actions in the past. To form the imperfect, drop the -ons on the nous form of the present tense and add the endings -ais, -ais, -ait, -ions, -iez and -aient. For example, Nous parlons -> je parlais (I used to speak, was speaking).
Apr 20, 2021 · L’imparfait is the French version of the “past progressive” or “past continuous” tense: “ was [verb]+-ing ” etc. For instance: Je pensais à toi. = I was thinking about you. → Here the verb “ penser ” (= to think) is in l’imparfait. It makes “ Je pensais. ” = I was thinking. This is the gist of it.
Sep 8, 2019 · The French imperfect (imparfait) is a descriptive past tense that indicates an ongoing state of being or a repeated or incomplete action. The beginning and end of the state of being or action are not indicated, and the imperfect is very often translated in English as "was" or "was ___-ing." The imperfect can indicate any of the following:
The imperfect tense ( l'imparfait ), one of several past tenses in French, is used to describe states of being and habitual actions in the past. It also has several idiomatic uses . stem. The stem of the imparfait is the first person plural ( nous) form of the present tense, minus the -ons. The imparfait stem is regular for all verbs except être :
Along with the passé composé, the imparfait serves as one of the two most important past tense conjugations in French. In its simplest definition, the imperfect is used for describing events that have no clear beginning or end. Of course, we’re talking about French grammar, so things do get a bit trickier from here.
