Language/French/Grammar/Indirectly-transitive-verbs

Indirectly transitive verbs

Indirectly transitive verbs take an object introduced by a preposition:

Object introduced by à

Examples

French	Translation
assister à un spectacle	watch a show
compatir à la douleur de quelqu'un	sympathize with someone's pain
croire au diable	believe in the devil
participer aux activités	to take part in the activities
en vouloir à son frère	hold a grudge against one's brother
penser à l'avenir de son fils	think about the future of his son
réfléchir à son passé	reflect on one's past
pourvoir (subvenir) aux besoins de sa famille	provide for the needs of his family
songer à un voyage en France	think about a trip to France
veiller au bon déroulement de la soirée	ensure the smooth running of the evening

Note

• "Penser" can take an object preceded by de with the meaning "to have an opinion about something":
  • Qu'est-ce que vous pensez de son article? 'What do you think of his article?'
• "veiller sur quelqu'un" means "to watch over somebody".
• Croire
  • "Croire à" is used to mean "to believe in the existence of some phenomenon".
    • "croire aux fées" (to believe in fairies),
    • "croire au bonheur" (to believe in happiness).
  • "Croire" can also take direct objects:
    • "Je crois cette histoire" (I believe this story),
    • "Elle le croit" (She believes him).
  • "Croire en" means "to believe in" in the sense of "to have faith in":
    • "croire en Dieu" (to believe in God)
    • "croire en ses co-équipiers" (to believe in one's team-mates)

Object introduced by de

French	Translation
déborder d'eau	overflow with water
déjeuner de fruits	lunch on fruit
dépendre des circonstances	depend on the circumstances
dîner de fruits de mer	make a seafood dinner
fourmiller d'insectes	swarm with insects
grouiller de moustiques	swarm with mosquitoes
gémir de douleur	moan in pain
regorger de coins romantiques	to be full of (abound with) romantic corners
répondre de ses actes	answer for one's actions
parler de ses amis	speak of one's friends
rougir de honte	go red with shame
trembler de peur	to tremble with fear
rire de ses amis	laugh at one's friends
tenir de son père	take after one's father
triompher de son adversaire	overcome one's opponent
vivre de rien	live on nothing
vivre d'amour et d'eau fraiche	Meaning: to live on love alone; to be irresponsible Literally: to live on love and fresh water

Videos

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Les verbes transitifs et intransitifs (2)

Table of Contents

Nouns

• Types
• Gender
• Plural

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Determiners

• Articles
• Typical use of the definite article
• Typical use of the indefinite article
• The partitive article: du, de l', de la, des
• Use of indefinite and partitive articles after the negative forms ne... pas, ne... jamais, ne... plus, ne... guère
• Omission of the article
• Demonstrative determiners
• Possessive determiners

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Personal and impersonal pronouns

• Subject pronouns
• Object pronouns
• Stressed pronouns
• Demonstrative pronouns
• Possessive pronouns

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Adjectives

• Adjectives modifying the noun
• Adjectives which follow verbs or verbal expressions
• Adjectives with complements
• Indefinite and negative noun phrases with adjective complements
• Adjectives used as nouns
• Adjectives used as adverbs
• Masculine and feminine forms of adjectives
• Plural forms of adjectives
• Adjective agreement with nouns
• Invariable adjectives
• Compound adjectives
• Comparative and superlative forms of adjectives
• Subjunctive versus indicative in clauses dependent on a superlative adjective
• Absolute use of the superlative

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Adverbs

• Function of adverbs
• Formation of adverbs with the ending -ment
• Adjectives used as adverbs without addition of -ment
• Phrases used as adverbs
• English and French adverb formation
• Types of adverbs
• Location of adverbs

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Numbers, measurements, time and quantifiers

• Cardinal numbers
• Ordinal numbers
• Fractions
• Some differences in the use of cardinal and ordinal numbers in French and English
• Measurements and comparisons
• Dates, days, years
• Clock time
• Money
• Quantifiers

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Verb forms

• Conjugations
• Easy ways of generating some parts of the paradigms
• Changes in the stem form of some -er conjugation verbs
• Verbs whose stems end in c- or g-
• Verb paradigms

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Verb constructions

• Relations between verbs and their complements
• Intransitive constructions
• Directly transitive verbs
• Indirectly transitive verbs
• Ditransitive verbs
• The passive
• Pronominal verbs
• Impersonal verbs
• Verbs which take noun + adjective or noun + noun complements

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Verb and participle agreement

• Subject-verb agreement
• Agreement of the past participle with the subject of être
• Agreement of the past participle of verbs conjugated with avoir with a preceding direct object
• Agreement of the past participle of pronominal verbs in compound tenses

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Tense

• The present
• The past
• The future
• Other tenses indicating the time at which events occur relative to other events
• Combining tenses
• Tenses in direct and reported descriptions of events
• Tenses with si

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The subjunctive, modal verbs, exclamatives and imperatives

• The attitude of the subject to events: the subjunctive
• The use of devoir, pouvoir, savoir, falloir
• The French equivalents of the English modal verbs: 'would', 'should', 'could', 'may', 'might', 'ought to', and 'must'
• Exclamatives
• Imperatives

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The infinitive

• Introduction: what are infinitives?
• Infinitives as complements to other verbs
• Verbs which take infinitive complements without a linking preposition
• Verbs which take infinitive complements preceded by the preposition à
• Verbs which take an infinitive complement preceded by de
• Omission of objects before infinitives
• Infinitives as complements to adjectives
• Infinitives as complements to nouns
• Infinitives in subordinate clauses
• Infinitives as polite commands
• Quick-reference index to verbs taking infinitive complements

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Prepositions

• Introduction
• Prepositions listed alphabetically from à to vers
• French translations for common English prepositions

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Question formation

• Introduction
• Yes/no questions
• Information questions
• Order of object pronouns in questions involving inversion
• Order of negative particles in questions involving inversion
• Use of question words and phrases: qui?, que?, quoi?, quel?, de qui?, avec combien de? etc.
• Indirect questions

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Relative clauses

• Introduction
• Use of relative qui
• Use of relative que
• Preposition plus qui
• Use of lequel in relative clauses
• Use of dont, de qui, duquel/de laquelle/desquels/desquelles
• The use of où as a relative pronoun
• Use of relative quoi
• Free relative clauses and the use of ce qui, ce que, ce dont, ce à quoi, ce sur quoi, etc.
• Translating 'whoever', 'whatever', 'wherever', 'whenever', 'however'
• Indicative and subjunctive in relative clauses

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Negation

• Introduction
• Location of sentence negators
• Order of negators in multiple negation
• Omission of ne in sentence negation
• Order of negative elements in questions and imperatives
• ne... pas
• ne... que
• ne... aucun(e), ne... nul(le)
• ne... jamais
• ne... plus
• ne... guère
• ne... rien
• ne... personne
• ne... ni... ni
• sans used with other negators
• ne used alone

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Conjunctions and other linking constructions

• Introduction
• Coordinating conjunctions
• Subordinating conjunctions
• Conjunctions sometimes confused by English speakers
• Repeated subordinating conjunctions
• Subordinating conjunctions used with infinitive clauses
• après avoir/ être + past participle linking an infinitive clause to a main clause
• Past participle phrases used as linkers
• Present participles and gerunds

Other Lessons

• Choosing between il est and c'est
• Easy way of generating the imperative mood
• Unstressed and Stressed Pronouns
• Quantifiers and personal pronouns
• Differences in the use of numbers in French and English Ordinal number abbreviations
• Plural of words in "Al"
• Conjugation group 2 — verbs whose infinitive ends in —ir
• Use of an année, jour journée, matin matinée, soir soirée
• ensuite VS puis
• Ordinal numbers
• Gender
• Formation of the passive in French
• Mass nouns used countably
• Polite Form
• Use of stressed pronouns for emphasis