French Word Order - Imperative ~ Ordre des mots
Lesson on French word order when using the imperative
The order of words in a French sentence can be very confusing, due to affirmative and negative imperative constructions and object and adverbial pronouns. This lesson will teach you exactly how to order your sentences when using the imperative.
The first thing you need to understand is that there are two kinds of imperatives, and the word order is different for each of them.
| I. | Negative Imperatives | |||||||||
| Negative imperatives are fairly easy to work with, because their word order is the same as that of all other simple verb conjugations: | ||||||||||
| Any object pronouns precede the verb and the negative structure surrounds the pronoun(s) + verb: | ||||||||||
| Finis ! | Finish! |
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| Ne finis pas ! | Don't finish! | |||||||||
| Ne le finis pas ! | Don't finish it! | |||||||||
| Lisez ! | Read! | |||||||||
| Ne lisez pas ! | Don't read! | |||||||||
| Ne le lisez pas ! | Don't read it! | |||||||||
| Ne me le lisez pas ! | Don't read it to me! | |||||||||
| II. | Affirmative Imperatives | |||||||||
| These are more complicated, for three reasons. | ||||||||||
| A. | The word order is different from that of all other verb tenses/moods: the pronouns follow the verb and are connected to it and each other with hyphens. | |||||||||
| Finis-le ! | Finish it! | |||||||||
| Allons-y ! | Let's go! | |||||||||
| Mangez-les ! | Eat them! | |||||||||
| Donne-lui-en ! | Give him some! | |||||||||
| B. | The order of the pronouns in affirmative commands is slightly different from all other verb tenses/moods: | |||||||||
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| Envoie-le-nous ! | Send it to us! | |||||||||
| Expliquons-la-leur ! | Let's explain it to them! | |||||||||
| Donnez-nous-en ! | Give us some! | |||||||||
| C. | The pronouns me and te change to moi and toi, unless they are followed by y or en, in which case they contract to m' and t'. | |||||||||
| Lève-toi ! | Get up! | |||||||||
| Va-t'en ! | Go away! | |||||||||
| Parlez-moi ! | Talk to me! | |||||||||
| Test on imperative word order
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