UP TO YOU. No untimely “s” in the imperative! The particular mode of injunctions only accepts it in certain very specific cases.
By Louise Cuneo And Emmanuel Durget
Published on
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QWhen should you put an “s” in the imperative? Here’s a funny question. Elementary school teaches that it is precisely not necessary to put “s” to this second person of the singular a little particular which is that of the imperative. It is both true and false.
Here is a rule – in appearance – simple, but which does not seem to have marked everyone’s mind. The imperative is this mode of conjugation used for injunctions: “remember! », « rack your brains! », « Think! “. The imperative makes it possible to express an order, an encouragement, or even to ask for a favour. Or, in the negative form, to signify a prohibition.
A group question
With this somewhat unusual mode, verbs are only conjugated in the second person singular (“look!”) or plural (“look!”), and in the first person plural (“let’s look!”). Verbs are not preceded by their subject personal pronoun. And, to construct it, it suffices to add to the same radical as that of the present indicative the endings “-e, -ons and -ez”. You should therefore not put an “s” in the imperative for the verbs of the first group (that is to say the verbs that end in “er”, like “to eat”) and certain verbs of the third group ( like “to offer” or “to gather”), even if it is the second person singular! Which therefore gives “eats”, “dreams”, “flies”, “seeks” and “finds”…
READ ALSOHow do I know when to write “-quant” or “-cant”?Sounds simple, right? Too simple, perhaps? Yes, once is not custom, there are many exceptions. With the imperative, beware of verbs which are followed by the pronouns “en” or “y”: there, the addition of an “s” is justified, joined to the pronoun which follows it by a hyphen . Thus, “remember to warn him” becomes “think about it”, or even “go to your room” becomes “go ahead”. But there is also the exception of the exception: when “en” or “y” are followed by an infinitive, the “s” is no longer justified: “go get your bag there”, without “s” therefore, and not “go get your bag”, which would sound very bad. Besides, it is not so bad to sometimes rely on one’s ear.
This is the case with the pronouns “me” and “you”, which elide before the pronouns “en” and “y”. The vowels of these pronouns are replaced by an apostrophe: “Donne-m’en” and not “donne-moi s’en”, with an “s” or a “z” which would come out of who knows where. Conclusion: no untimely “s” in the imperative!