Introduction to the French Imperative Mood

The imperative, called limpà ©ratif in French, is a verb mood which is used to: give an orderexpress a desiremake a requestoffer advicerecommend something Unlike all other French verb tenses and personal moods, the subject pronoun is not used with the imperative: Fermez la porte.Close the door. Mangeons maintenant.Lets eat now.Ayez la bontà © de mattendre.Please wait for me. Veuillez mexcuser.Please excuse me. The above are called affirmative commands, because they are telling someone to do something. Negative commands, which tell someone not to do something, are made by placing ne in front of the verb and the appropriate negative adverb after the verb: Ne parle pas!Dont speak! Noublions pas les livres.Lets not forget the books. Nayez jamais peur.Never be afraid. The imperative is not the only way to tell someone what to do in French — its how you give orders in French. French imperative conjugations are relatively simple. There are only three grammatical persons that can be used in the imperative:  tu,  nous, and  vous, and most of the conjugations are the same as the present tense — the only difference is that the  subject pronoun  is not used in the imperative. -ER Verbs Imperative Mood Conjugations   -ER verbs  (regular, stem-changing,  spelling change, and irregular): The imperative conjugations for  nous  and  vous  are the same as the present indicative, and the  tu  form of the imperative is the indicative minus the  final s:parler(tu) parle(nous) parlons(vous) parlezlever(tu) là ¨ve(nous) levons(vous) levezaller(tu) va(nous) allons(vous) allezVerbs which are conjugated like -ER verbs (meaning that in the indicative the  tu  form ends in -es), such as  ouvrir  and  souffrir, follow the same rules as -ER verbs.ouvrir(tu) ouvre(nous) ouvrons(vous) ouvrez -IR and -RE Verbs Imperative Mood Conjugations   -IR verbs  and  -RE verbs: The imperative conjugations for all regular and most* irregular -IR and -RE verbs are the same as the present indicative conjugations.finir(tu) finis(nous) finissons(vous) finissezattendre(tu) attends(nous) attendons(vous) attendezfaire(tu) fais(nous) faisons(vous) faites*Except for verbs conjugated like -ER verbs and the following four irregular imperative verbs:avoir(tu) aie(nous) ayons(vous) ayezà ªtre(tu) sois(nous) soyons(vous) soyezsavoir(tu) sache(nous) sachons(vous) sachezvouloir(tu) veuille(nous) n/a(vous) veuillez Negative Imperatives The order of words in a French sentence can be very confusing due to affirmative and negative imperative constructions and object and adverbial pronouns. Remember that there are two kinds of imperatives, affirmative and negative, and the word order is different for each of them. Negative imperatives are  easier  because their  word order  is the same as that of  all other simple verb conjugations: any object, reflexive, and/or adverbial pronouns precede the verb and the  negative structure  surrounds the pronoun(s) verb:Finis!  - Finish!Ne finis  pas!  - Dont finish!Ne le finis  pas!  - Dont finish it!Lisez!  - Read!Ne  lisez  pas!  - Dont read!Ne le  lisez  pas!  - Dont read it!Ne me le  lisez  pas!  - Dont read it to me! Affirmative Commands Affirmative commands are more complicated, for several reasons. 1.  The word order is for affirmative commands is different from that of all other verb tenses/moods: any pronouns follow the verb and are connected to it and to each other with  hyphens.Finis-le!  - Finish it!Allons-y!  - Lets go!Mangez-les!  - Eat them!Donne-lui-en!  - Give him some! 2.  The order of the pronouns in affirmative commands is slightly different from all other verb tenses/moods (see table at the bottom of the page):Envoie-le-nous!  - Send it to us!Expliquons-la-leur!  - Lets explain it to them!Donnez-nous-en!  - Give us some!Donne-le-moi!  - Give it to me! 3.  The pronouns  me  and  te  change to the  stressed pronouns  moi  and  toi...Là ¨ve-toi!  - Get up!Parlez-moi!  - Talk to me!Dis-moi!  - Tell me!...unless they are followed by  y or en, in which case they  contract  to  m  and  tVa-ten!  - Go away!Faites-my  penser.  - Remind me about it. 4.  When a  tu  command is followed by the pronouns  y or en, the final s is not dropped from the verb conjugation:Vas-y!  - Go away!Parles-en.  - Talk about it.