Language/French/Grammar/Indirectly-transitive-verbs

Indirectly transitive verbs

Indirectly transitive verbs take an object introduced by a preposition:

Introduced by à

French	Translation
assister à une réunion	to be present at a meeting
compatir à la douleur de quelqu'un	to feel for somebody in their sorrow
croire au diable	to believe in the devil
en vouloir à son cousin	to hold a grudge against one's cousin
participer aux activités	to take part in the activities
penser à son avenir	to think about one's future
pourvoir aux besoins de quelqu'un	to provide for somebody's needs
réfléchir à son passé	to reflect on one's past
songer à un voyage en Italie	to envisage a trip to Italy
veiller au bon règlement d'une affaire	to see to the proper handling of a matter

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)

Introduced by de

French	Translation
déborder d'eau	to overflow with water
déjeuner de fruits	to lunch on fruit
dépendre des circonstances	to depend on the circumstances
dîner de moules et de frites	to dine on mussels and french fries
fourmiller d'abeilles	to swarm with bees
gémir de douleur	to groan with pain
grouiller de fourmis	to swarm with ants
parler de ses amis	to speak of one's friends
regorger de richesses	to abound in wealth
répondre de son ami	to answer for one's friend
rire de ses compagnons	to laugh at one's friends
rougir de honte	to go red with shame
tenir de sa mère	to take after one's mother
trembler de peur	to tremble with fear
triompher de son adversaire	to overcome one's opponent
vivre de l'air du temps	to live on fresh air alone
vivre de presque rien	to live on next to nothing

Other Chapters

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

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Sources

• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=30jZ4m1_65k
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IiPaQj_T1Wk