Past Tenses in Context: Narrating Stories

Welcome to the final lesson of this course. You now know the passé composé, the imparfait, the plus-que-parfait, the passé récent, and you can recognise the passé simple. In this lesson, we bring them all together by practising narrative writing.

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The Roles of Each Tense in a Narrative

Tense	Role in a Story	English Equivalent
Imparfait	Setting the scene, background, descriptions, ongoing states	was doing, used to do
Passé composé	Main events, actions that move the plot forward	did, has done
Plus-que-parfait	Flashbacks — events that happened before the main story	had done
Passé récent	Something that just happened (usually in dialogue)	just did
Passé simple	Same role as passé composé, but in formal/literary writing	did (literary)

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Building a Narrative: Step by Step

Step 1: Set the Scene (Imparfait)

C'était un dimanche après-midi en novembre. Il faisait gris et il pleuvait légèrement. Les rues étaient presque vides.