Le Passé Composé

1. Le Passé Composé The compound past tense in French

2. General Format • The passé composé has two major components • The helping verb is either avoir and, rarely, etre • The helping verb is conjugated with the subject

3. Examples • J’aiparléfrançais. • Tu as fini ton travail • Monique a vendu son vélo.

4. Past participles -er verbs. Drop the –er and add é ex. Parlerparlé -ir verbs Drop the –ir and add I ex. Finirfini -re verbs Drop the –re and add –u ex. Vendrevendu

5. Formation • Replace the present tense verb with the same form of avoir (etre) and place the past participle next to it • Nous parlonsfrançais. • Nous avonsparléfrançais. • Tu vends ton vélo. • Tu as vendu ton vélo

6. Irregular past participles • The most common verbs in French have irregular past participles. You will need to memorize them.

7. The LIST • Etre-étémettre-mis • Avoir-eupouvoir-pu • Faire-fait venir-venu • Lire-lu • Devoir-du • Voir-vu • Vouloir-voulu

8. “etre” verbs • There is a small list of verbs in French that require you to use “etre” in the passé composé. • All of these verbs are intransitive. In other words, they do not have a direct object.

9. Agreement of Past Participle • A verb that uses etre as a helping verb must have agreement with the subject and past participle. • If the subject is masculine, there is no ending • If the subject is feminine, there is an –e added • If the subject is masculine plural, there is an –s added • If the subject is feminne plural, add -es

10. Examples • Jacques estallé à Paris. • Isabelle estallée à Paris. • Les garçonssontallés à Paris. • Les fillessontallées à Paris

11. Direct Object Pronouns • If a pronoun preceeds the helping verb in the passé composé, the participle must agree in number and gender with the direct object pronoun. This does not apply to indirect object pronouns.

12. Examples • J’ai vu la joliefille. (No agreement because the direct object follows the helping verb) • La fille. Je l’aivue. • Les livres Nous les avonslus. • Nous avonslu les livres.

13. Negation • The “ne” and “pas” surround the verb, or pronoun and verb, in the passé composé • Il estsorti. Il n’est pas sorti • La voiture. Je l’aiachetée • Je ne l’ai pas achetée