# FR: toujours + passé composé / imparfait



## reine_irene

Bonjour!

Je sais qu'il y a une différence légére entre ces deux phrases. Je voudrais savoir laquelle.
Si il s'agit de I've always wanted/done/thought dois-je dire j'ai toujours voulu/fait/pensé etc. mais quand il s'agit de I *still *wanted/There was *still *etc. c'est plutot Je voulais toujours/Il y avais toujours.

Ou je me trompe 

*J'ai toujours voulu *des enfants et j'aime profondément les miens. (I've always wanted)
*J'avais toujours *l'impression que quelque chose en moi ne tournait pas rond. (There was still...)
*Je n'avais toujours* pas une entière confiance en mon domestique. (I still didn't trust...)

L'été finissait, et il *parlait/il a parlé*  toujours de louer une maison de campagne.

Merci beaucoup!


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## Maître Capello

_J'ai toujours voulu_… = I've always wanted…
_Je voulais toujours_… = I always wanted… / I still wanted…

In your last sentence, you need the imparfait either because such talks were frequent/habitual or because he still hadn't changed his mind about it.

_L'été finissait et il *parlait* toujours de louer une maison de campagne._


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## reine_irene

Oui, merci. Ce matin j'ai tout compris. Je n'aurais pas dû le demander.
*Toujours* peut avoir deux sens: *la permanence* dans la totalité du temps ou d'une période déterminée et* la continuation*, *la persistance* d'un état du passé jusqu'au moment présent ou au moment considéré.


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## Soleil_Couchant

Please someone help me because my brain wanted to explode. I took a French lesson and we were going over this one thing as imparfait vs passé composé. The teacher insisted it was passé composé but I just could NOT understand why. Even looking above, it seems like it should be imparfait. She did not do a good job explaining and just said it was an "event in the past"and that for French people it's like a "knee-jerk" natural knowledge to know what is imparfait vs. passé composé. Good, doesn't help me much. ...

What I don't get, even if you're referring to something in the past, but it was still "habit" to think that way, and it might possibly still be how you feel...why would it be passé composé? I'm just confused because to me the word "toujours" shows something ongoing, which I thought was imparfait.  (Even if it was a habitude _in the past_.)

Anyway the example from the worksheets was

"J [.....] toujours que les restaurants parisiens étaient très chers. Un jour, alors que je me promenais sur le bords de Seine, j'ai été pris soudain d'une faim violente..."

And she was saying it should be "J'ai toujours trouvé que les..."

I just didn't get it. She insisted it was "isolated in the past" ... But if you "always" think something, it's not isolated, is it?  It seems like in the rest of the story, the narrator was obligated to stop and eat somewhere, and didn't say anything about the price since it would be impolite...then for seven years they've been working there to pay off the meal that they bought. Lol. so, it doesn't seem that their opinion changed on it being expensive.

Someone please help explain why it's passé composé here?  If it's something he always thinks, why not imparfait.


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## Maître Capello

The context you provided suggests that the *passé composé* is indeed the appropriate tense. Only some very specific and unlikely contexts could justify the imparfait. The passé composé is especially suitable here because there is a link between the past and the present, in a similar way to the English present perfect: _I've always found that_…

_J'*ai* toujours *trouvé* que les restaurants parisiens étaient très chers._


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## Soleil_Couchant

I don't understand why though....I still don't.

And is there a rule about the past and present being linked that makes it passé composé? Obviously I'm missing something here.


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## Oddmania

We say "J'*ai *toujours *trouvé*..." just as you would say "I *have *always *thought*..." in English. I can only think of two situations where "Je trouvais toujours" would be appropriate:

*1.* You no longer think what you used to think: "Avant, je *trouvais *toujours que les restaurants parisiens étaient très chers, mais depuis que j'habite à Dubaï, les restaurants de Paris ne me semblent plus aussi hors de prix que ça". → _Je trouvais (toujours) = I used to think_...

*2.* "_Toujours_" means "_still_": "Il avait passé une heure à essayer de me convaincre que les restaurants parisiens n'étaient pas si chers que ça, mais je *trouvais *toujours (= quand même) qu'ils l'étaient". → J_e trouvais toujours = I still thought..._​


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## Soleil_Couchant

Hm okay, thanks for the examples of when you'd use the imparfait, Oddmania. And after walking away from the computer I was thinking about what Maitre Capello said and what you reiterated...that in English we do say "I've always thought..."...speaking about something in the present. So yeah, the past tense form of "thought" is used, but it's used speaking in the present. I do need to look at it that way and not thinking about the "rules" of PC vs. imparfait.

I think what made my brain want to explode is we're told that "habitudes" = imparfait, and I would think an always-held-belief would fall under that. but I'm just still looking at it the wrong way. Not everything fits into the definitions/neat categories.


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## binhle410

je *trouvais *toujours que les restaurants parisiens étaient très chers
I think the sentence above could also mean that right now I may or may not find Parisian restaurants so expensive.


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## Mérovée

[Quote wisely and trim to the relevant part]

The difference between the _passé composé_ and the _imparfait_ is a difference of what linguists call *aspect*.  The _passé composé_ is marked for completion; the _imparfait_ is not.  (It may be something completed; it just isn't indicated to be so, which makes a difference in how it is 'felt'.)  This simple distinction is usually thought to be too abstract for students (especially American students) to understand (who has even heard of "aspect"?), so pedagogues have invented all sorts of complicated and confusing 'rules' that have the result of... making people's brains explode!!


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## Soleil_Couchant

So, if something is continuing in the present time (like thinking Parisian restaurants are too expensive), why wasn't it the imparfait? To me if it's ongoing, it's not completed. That was my confusion. I'm not trying to be combative, I'm seriously asking. I still don't "get" this whole thing, I'm just going with it being the passé composé without really understanding it...which goes against my personality. But alas, sometimes I just have to accept not understanding something and go with it because it is what it is. Happened a lot in calculus, too


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## Mérovée

[Quote wisely and trim to the relevant part]

Because the difference is _subjective_, not _objective_.  It's you who decide!  Aspect indicates how _speakers_ are thinking of whatever they're talking about at the time they talk about it.  It doesn't matter whether what you're talking about is ongoing or completed, what matters is whether you want to 'mark the thing as completed' or not when you talk about it -- if you will, whether you want to 'put yourself inside the situation' or not.  It changes the way the speaker (and the hearer) feel about the thing, but not the thing itself. 

Suppose, for example, in English, you said to somebody, talking about something you said to someone in the past:  "And you were serious?"  In French, you could say EITHER "Et tu étais sérieux ?" OR "Et tu as été sérieux ?"  Either one is correct, but each feels different.  If you say "Et tu étais sérieux ?" It's as if you were 'inside' the moment, reliving the moment again.  But if you say "Et tu as été sérieux ?" it's as if you were stepping back and looking back the moment 'from the outside.'  In either case what you're talking about is over, completed -- but with your imagination you are putting yourself back 'into it' by using the _imparfait_. 

That's why people struggle so much with this distinction -- they don't realize that it's up to them to express how they're feeling about (or whether they're re-experiencing 'from the inside,' if you will) what they're talking about, using an aspect distinction that doesn't exist in English:  after all, in English, either question would be translated "And you were serious?"  The nuance French forces you to express is not generally expressed in English (though of course with optional devices you can 'give the feeling' in other ways if you want to). 

At the risk of confusing things further, note that in English it's _incompletion_ that you can mark a verb for if you want to, by using the so-called "progressive" forms -- in English you could say "And you were being serious?" -- which would probably just be translated as "Et tu étais sérieux?"


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## Soleil_Couchant

So......why did the teacher say me using the imparfait there was wrong? In my example in post #4. She wouldn't accept the imparfait as correct...even though subjectively in my mind it fit as still being an active thing...and it wasn't actually over, either, because they still currently believed it, I feel.  Maybe not though. Maybe the point was "once upon a time, I thought restaurants were expensive. Then I had an experience that proved it." So.....that's more passe compose because...argh I don't know lol

(and thanks for taking the time to explain)


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## k@t

Hello Soleil_Couchant, 

1) quand l’imparfait est temporel (puisqu’il existe des usages non temporels de l’imparfait, i.e. des usages modaux), il désigne un évènement forcément *passé* et *coupé* de la situation d’énonciation.
2) le passé composé a plusieurs valeurs, notamment une valeur de passé (correspond grosso modo au prétérit anglais) et une valeur d’accompli dans le présent (correspond grosso modo au present prefect).

Dans la phrase _J’ai toujours_ (= de tout temps) _trouvé que_…, il est impossible d’avoir un imparfait, puisque le lien avec la situation d’énonciation *n’est pas coupé*.
Le passé composé a ici sa valeur d’accompli dans le présent : cette opinion démarre dans le passé, et se poursuit jusqu’au moment de l’énonciation (moment présent). Au-delà de cette limite (le moment de l'énonciation), l’opinion peut continuer d’être vraie ou non, on peut ainsi envisager deux suites :
> _J’ai toujours trouvé que les restaurants parisiens étaient chers, et je le pense encore aujourd’hui_. = jusqu’à présent c’était le cas, et ça l’est toujours : mon opinion n’a pas changé
> _J’ai toujours trouvé que les restaurants parisiens étaient chers, mais depuis quelque temps, je constate que les prix baissent._ = jusqu’à présent c’était le cas, mais il semblerait que maintenant ce ne soit plus le cas : mon opinion a changé / est en train de changer.

On aurait pu mettre un présent, sans *toujours* :
> _Je trouve que les restaurants_… = c’est juste une opinion présente, on ne sait pas si cette personne avait un avis sur cette question dans le passé.

avec *toujours* – mais dans le sens de *encore* et non dans celui de *de tout temps* :
> _Je trouve toujours que les restaurants_… = la personne donne une opinion présente qui confirme son opinion antérieure sur la cherté des restaurants parisiens.


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## Mérovée

On the question of _J'ai toujours trouvé_ being in the passé composé in the sentence above, which I didn't address before because, to confess the sad truth, I didn't fully understand the question being discussed, not having read all of the posts (which, yes, I know cannot be justified, sorry! _désolé ! je m'excuse ! je ne le referai plus !_ ), Denise Rochat in _Contrastes : Grammaire du français courant _(3rd ed. [2009], p. 118 -- an excellent book _à tous égards_) classes it as a special use of the passé composé under the rubric Habitudes ou actions fréquentes avec prolongement dans le présent : 

« Le passé composé s'emploie également pour exprimer des habitudes ou des actions fréquentes au passé lorsque celles-ci ont encore un prolongement possible dans le présent. »  

Rochat gives two examples : _Ces gens ont toujours travaillé très dur ; _and _Ils n'ont jamais été riches, mais ils ont toujours vécu confortablement.  _

But she doesn't really explain _why -- _and k@t gives what I think is an excellent explanation of _why_ this is so!  Merci...


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## Soleil_Couchant

k@t, thanks for the explanation...my response is delayed because my brain is a little "surchargé" with academic French at the moment and I feel I'd need to study your post longer to really understand the nuances, but I will one day! The main thing that stands out to me is 1)....

"1) quand l’imparfait est temporel (puisqu’il existe des usages non temporels de l’imparfait, i.e. des usages modaux), il désigne un évènement forcément *passé* et *coupé* de la situation d’énonciation."

That seems to be the part I was missing...that's just a rule, then. It has to be cut from the present in order to be imparfait (which is continuous, habitual)...but it has to be _in the past_, not still connected to the present. That would explain why my guess was totally wrong, since it WAS still true in the present. I just have to ingrain this in my brain! Thanks.


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