Language/French/Grammar/se-as-an-alternative-to-an-English-passive

se as an alternative to an English passive

se may be used with a verb as an alternative to an English passive:

• Un collant se lave en deux minutes

A pair of tights can be washed in two minutes

• Le Gamay se boit frais

Gamay (light red wine) is best drunk chilled

• L'uni se vend bien cet hiver

Plain colours are selling well this winter

This usage is restricted to special circumstances. The sentence must describe a state of affairs and not an action and the verb must not suggest through its tense that the action takes place in a limited time span.

Related Lessons

• ensuite VS puis
• How to recognize when the start of a relative clause is a direct object
• An adjective agreeing with nouns linked by de
• Adjective—adjective compounds
• Gender of Nouns Names of ships and restaurants
• Indirectly transitive in French but directly transitive in English
• Gender of compound nouns
• Ordinal numbers
• Plurals of nouns ending in –al
• Direct object and indirect object pronouns differences between English and French
• Use of the definite article to indicate a habitual action
• Gender
• Colour adjective compounds
• Subject verb agreement — Agreement with more than one subject linked by “et”