French Imperative: How To Give Orders In French
When you learn French, you'll need to understand how the imperative works (giving orders).
See the sample dialogues and grammar notes below to learn how to give and understand orders using French.
Ou est la douane?
La voila a gauche.
Porteur, etes-vous libre?
Prenez nos bagages, s'ils vous plait.
Nous avons en quatre.
Portez-les a la douane, s'il vous plait.
Avez-vous quelque chose a declarer? Alcool, cigarettes?
Rien, monsieur.
Ouvrez, s'il vous plait.
A new construction that we see here is the imperative.
“Prenez nos bagages”, “Portez-les” and “Ouvrez” are all in the imperative mood. The imperative is used to give an order to someone.
As we know, normally a sentence needs a subject, such as “you take”, “you carry” or “you open”.
In the imperative, the subject is understood.
In these cases, it is understood to be “you”.
The imperative can be in the second person singular “prennes nos bagages”, “portes-les”, the first person plural, “allons-y” or, most commonly, the second person plural “Prenez nos bagages” “Portez-les” .
The same construction exists in English. When we say “open the door”, there is also an implied “you”.
Excusez-moi, je vais chercher mon porteur.
Ah, vous voila! Portez les bagages a une voiture, s'il vous plait.
Je viens, monsieur.
Mettez les valises la-dessus, s'il vous plait.
Cela fait combien?
Dix-huit euros, monsieur. Trois euros par valise.
You may have heard or seen the expression “Voila”. It is a very useful term to express discovery or presentation. Here we see it used when Mr. Duprés finds his porter.
Vous voila!
By itself, “Voila” usually means “Here it is” or “ Look at this.”
You can also say “Le voila!” (There it or he is), “La voila!”- (There it or she is) and “Me voila!”- (Here I am!).
Order of pronouns: le, la les and lui.
Pronouns are used to replace nouns:
Tu as donne cette idee a Maman.
Tu lui as donne cette idee.
(lui replaces a Maman)
Tu l'as donne a Maman.
(l' -actually la, but before a vowel-replaces cette idee)
Tu la lui as donne.
(both are now replaced)
The order of pronouns may seem difficult, but there is a simple principle: le, la and les are “weaker” pronouns than lui and leur.
They are always placed before lui or leur.
J'ai donné mon billet au contrôleur. Je le lui ai donné.
J'ai donné mon permis de conduire aux gendarmes. Je le leur ai donné.
Practice the French imperative
Let's practice the imperative in French!
- Open the door (la porte). (Formal or plural)
- Take my bags. (Informal)
- Let's go!
- Put the valises on the table (Formal or plural)
- Give the money (l'argent) to the agent.
Now let's practice pronouns.
- Give the money to him.
- They gave their driver's licenses to the policemen.
- They gave them to them.
- I gave my passport (passeporte) to the customs agent (douanier).
- I gave it to him.
- Partager l'amour (share):
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