Contents

Guide for the user
Glossary of key grammatical terms
Acknowledgements
Acknowledgements for the second edition
Acknowledgements for the third edition
Acknowledgements for the fourth edition
1	Nouns
	1.1	Types of noun
	1.2	Gender
	1.3	Number
2	Determiners
	2.1	Articles
	2.2	Typical uses of the definite article
	2.3	Typical uses of the indefinite article
	2.4	The partitive article: du, de l', de la, des
	2.5	Use of indefinite and partitive articles after the negative forms ne . . . pas, ne . . . jamais, ne . . . plus, ne . . . guère
	2.6	Omission of the article
	2.7	Demonstrative determiners
	2.8	Possessive determiners
3	Personal and impersonal pronouns
	3.1	Subject pronouns
	3.2	Object pronouns
	3.3	Stressed pronouns
	3.4	Demonstrative pronouns
	3.5	Possessive pronouns
4	Adjectives
	4.1	Adjectives modifying the noun
	4.2	Adjectives which follow verbs or verbal expressions
	4.3	Adjectives with complements
	4.4	Indefinite and negative noun phrases with adjective complements
	4.5	Adjectives used as nouns
	4.6	Adjectives used as adverbs, and adverbs used as adjectives
	4.7	Masculine and feminine forms of adjectives
	4.8	Plural forms of adjectives
	4.9	Adjective agreement with nouns
	4.10	Invariable adjectives
	4.11	Compound adjectives
	4.12	Comparative and superlative forms of adjectives
	4.13	Subjunctive versus indicative in clauses dependent on a superlative adjective
	4.14	Absolute use of the superlative
5	Adverbs
	5.1	Function of adverbs
	5.2	Formation of adverbs with the ending -ment
	5.3	Adjectives used as adverbs without addition of -ment
	5.4	Phrases used as adverbs
	5.5	English and French adverb formation
	5.6	Types of adverbs
	5.7	Location of adverbs
6	Numbers, measurements, time and quantifiers
	6.1	Cardinal numbers
	6.2	Ordinal numbers
	6.3	Fractions
	6.4	Some differences in the use of cardinal and ordinal numbers in French and English
	6.5	Measurements and comparisons
	6.6	Dates, days, years
	6.7	Clock time
	6.8	Money
	6.9	Quantifiers
7	Verb forms
	7.1	Introduction
	7.2	Conjugations
	7.3	Easy ways of generating some parts of the paradigms
	7.4	Changes in the stem form of some -er conjugation verbs
	7.5	Verbs whose stems end in c- or g-
	7.6	Verb paradigms
8	Verb constructions
	8.1	Relations between verbs and their complements
	8.2	Intransitive constructions
	8.3	Directly transitive verbs
	8.4	Indirectly transitive verbs
	8.5	Ditransitive verbs
	8.6	The passive
	8.7	Pronominal verbs
	8.8	Impersonal verbs
	8.9	Verbs which take noun + adjective or noun + noun complements
9	Verb and participle agreement
	9.1	Subject-verb agreement
	9.2	Agreement of the past participle with the subject of être
	9.3	Agreement of the past participle of verbs conjugated with avoir with a preceding direct object
	9.4	Agreement of the past participle of pronominal verbs in compound tenses
10	Tense
	10.1	Introduction
	10.2	The present
	10.3	The past
	10.4	The future
	10.5	Other tenses indicating the time at which events occur relative to other events
	10.6	Combining tenses
	10.7	Tenses in direct and reported descriptions of events
	10.8	Tenses with si
11	The subjunctive, modal verbs, exclamatives and imperatives
	11.1	The attitude of the subject to events: the subjunctive
	11.2	The use of devoir, pouvoir, savoir, falloir
	11.3	The French equivalents of the English modal verbs: 'would', 'should', 'could', 'may', 'might', 'ought to' and 'must'
	11.4	Exclamatives
	11.5	Imperatives
12	The infinitive
	12.1	Introduction: what are infinitives?
	12.2	Infinitives as complements to other verbs
	12.3	Verbs which take infinitive complements without a linking preposition
	12.4	Verbs which take infinitive complements preceded by the preposition à
	12.5	Verbs which take an infinitive complement preceded by de
	12.6	Omission of objects before infinitives
	12.7	Infinitives as complements to adjectives
	12.8	Infinitives as complements to nouns
	12.9	Infinitives in subordinate clauses
	12.10	Infinitives as polite commands
	12.11	Quick-reference index to verbs taking infinitive complements
13	Prepositions
	13.1	Introduction
	13.2-13.58 Prepositions listed alphabetically from à to vers
	13.59	French translations for common English prepositions
14	Question formation
	14.1	Introduction
	14.2	Yes/no questions
	14.3	Information questions
	14.4	Order of object pronouns in questions involving inversion
	14.5	Order of negative particles in questions involving inversion
	14.6	Use of question words and phrases: qui?, que?, quoi?, quel?, de qui?, avec combien de? etc.
	14.7	Indirect questions
15	Relative clauses
	15.1	Introduction
	15.2	Use of relative qui
	15.3	Use of relative que
	15.4	Preposition plus qui
	15.5	Use of lequel in relative clauses
	15.6	Use of dont, de qui, duquel/de laquelle/desquels/desquelles
	15.7	The use of où as a relative pronoun
	15.8	Use of relative quoi
	15.9	Free relative clauses and the use of ce qui, ce que, ce dont, ce à quoi, ce sur quoi, etc.
	15.10	Translating 'whoever', 'whatever', 'wherever', 'whenever', 'however'
	15.11	Indicative and subjunctive in relative clauses
16	Negation
	16.1	Introduction
	16.2	Location of sentence negators
	16.3	Order of negators in multiple negation
	16.4	Omission of ne in sentence negation
	16.5	Order of negative elements in questions and imperatives
	16.6	ne . . . pas
	16.7	ne . . . que
	16.8	ne . . . aucun(e), ne . . . nul(le)
	16.9	ne . . . jamais
	16.10	ne . . . plus
	16.11	ne . . . guère
	16.12	ne . . . rien
	16.13	ne . . . personne
	16.14	ne . . . ni . . . ni
	16.15	sans used with other negators
	16.16	ne used alone
17	Conjunctions and other linking constructions
	17.1	Introduction
	17.2	Coordinating conjunctions
	17.3	Subordinating conjunctions
	17.4	Conjunctions sometimes confused by English speakers
	17.5	Repeated subordinating conjunctions
	17.6	Subordinating conjunctions used with infinitive clauses
	17.7	après avoir/être + past participle linking an infinitive clause to a main clause
	17.8	Past participle phrases used as linkers
	17.9	Present participles and gerunds
Appendix
Bibliography
Index