Grammer

[Darryl]

Hi

 

The last time I studied French was when I was 13.

I after too many years would like to speak french.

I recently bought Vol 1 introduction to french and I am competely lost with Etre,Avoir,Aller etc.

Would the english equivalent be noun,pronoun,adjective etc.

Thanks help would be appreciated to make it simple for me.

[Neil Coffey]

être, avoir and aller are all verbs.

So for example, être is the equivalent of (to) be, as in I want to be honest or they might be too worried. In many cases in French, you wouldn't literally use être but some other form in its place. For example, just as in English you wouldn't say I be Jack, in French you would say je suis Jacques ("I am Jacques"). But there's a sense that I am is "a form" of be (I am tired - Yes, I guess you might be). And so in French, there's a sense that (je) suis is "a form" of être, and the so-called "conjugation" of this verb is essentially the list of possible forms.

The verbs avoir and aller work in similar ways, meaning "to have" and "to go" respectively.

Just as in English, these common verbs have developed a range of idiomatic meanings and uses beyond their basic meanings. So for example, if you say in English I'm going to stay here, you're not actually saying that you're going anywhere. Similarly, French aller can be used to denote a future action, without necessarily indicating movement.

[Darryl]

Thanks for the reply.As I am just starting is this something that will come together eventually.
As i feel i might get to hung up on this at the start.

Thanks