"Avoir" Agreement Exceptions/Rules with Passé Composé

[Yuma]

I was reading my french textbook for my class regarding exceptions for agreement when using "avoir" with the passé composé, and I'm having a hard time understanding the points I've included below. 

The book I am referring to is French Four Years by Françoise Shein.

It says, "However, the past participle of a verb conjugated with avoir remains unchanged before an infinitive with its own direct object."

The example they provide: On jouait une pièce en plein air; je l'ai regardé jouer (l' is the object of jouer).

Also,

"With verbs of perception, if the object of the main verb is also the subject of the infinitive, the past participle agrees with the object."

Their example: Hier, je suis allée au jardin avec les enfants. Je les ai regardés jouer. (les is the object of regarder, les enfants
jouaient, j’ai regardé les enfants jouer).

Can anyone tell me what this means (either or both)? Thanks in advance.

[Neil Coffey]

I'll try and explain it a bit more clearly, though for reasons I'll mention, you shouldn't get too panicked about this.

First, let's consider English. In English, you can say things like:

1 (a) I saw the squirrel eating
1 (b) I saw the squirrel being eaten (by the enormous forest monster)

2 (a) I heard the children playing the trumpet
2 (b) I heard that music being played on a trumpet

All of these cases involve a construction where you put two verbs together ("see eating", "heard playing"), and where the first verb is to do with the senses (this is a "verb of perception")-- we could have included verbs like "noticed", "felt", "caught sight of", "overheard" etc.

Notice how in the (a) sentences, the second verb is active-- the thing before the verb (squirrel/children) is what is actually carrying out the action. Whereas in (b), the second verb is passive.

Now, French has a very similar construction, although in French the second verb in the pair stays in the infinitive (whereas in English, it's common to use the -ing form, though the infinitive is also sometimes possible). So for example:

to see eat(ing) = voir manger
to hear play(ing) = entendre jouer

However, in French, the second infinitive can be interpreted as being passive, at least in literary usage. So in other words:

to see being eaten = voir manger
to hear being played = entendre jouer

Now, there is a spelling convention in French that in the second type of case, where the infinitive is interpreted as being passive, the past participle never agrees. Whereas, in the first type of case, the past participle can potentially agree.

Especially prescriptive grammar books absolutely love to bang on about this point.

However: In reality, this is all a bit of mental masturbation:

- in speech (i.e. 95-99% of most people's language use), the issue is absolutely irrelevant;
- the issue practically never arises in writing either;
- it appears that the passive interpretation of the infinitive (i.e. entendre jouer meaning "heard being played" rather than just "heard playing") is something that is dying out anyway-- certainly not all French speakers get this interpretation (so that sentences like La pièce que j'ai entendu jouer just sound odd to them in the first place).

So... if you're studying French to a high level, it's one of these cases that I suppose you shoiuld know about "just for the sake of knowing", but it is really going to have very little impact on your usage of French. In several years of being a professional French translator, I think I can think of maybe one or two cases where this issue has arisen (i.e. cases where this "rule" would be applied to decide on the form of the past participle) in text I and my French colleagues have produced.

[Joseph]

Mr Coffey,

What about the case of two verbs together? For example, " I want to eat apples."
Is it, " Je veux manger des pommes" or " Je veux de manger des pommes"?
When do we place a "de" between 2 verbs?

Thanks