# French translation question (subjunctive related)
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-translation-question-subjunctive-related/550882
**Category:** Factual Questions
**Created:** [August 20, 2010, 3:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-translation-question-subjunctive-related/550882 "2010-08-20T15:48:29Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@sundog66](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sundog66)
#### Post date: [August 20, 2010, 3:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-translation-question-subjunctive-related/550882/1 "2010-08-20T15:48:29Z")
Just a quick question for French speakers: Are the following two French sentences grammatical and accurate as translations of the English versions? (I realize 2 is a little awkward in English; I just want to make the French is no worse.)
1:
I want Jean to open the door.
Je veux que Jean ouvre la porte.
2:
I want Jean to have opened the door.
Je veux que Jean ait ouvert la porte.
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### Author:  [@Kobal2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kobal2)
#### Post date: [August 20, 2010, 4:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-translation-question-subjunctive-related/550882/2 "2010-08-20T16:09:24Z")
Sounds right to me - sentence 2. is horribly awkward, but the grammar’s fine.
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### Author:  [@Arnold\_Winkelried](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Arnold_Winkelried)
#### Post date: [August 20, 2010, 5:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-translation-question-subjunctive-related/550882/3 "2010-08-20T17:53:44Z")
Except that Jean is a woman’s name, and in French should be Jeanne. 😉
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### Author:  [@Giles](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Giles)
#### Post date: [August 20, 2010, 6:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-translation-question-subjunctive-related/550882/4 "2010-08-20T18:01:17Z")
> [@Arnold\_Winkelried](#):
>
> Except that Jean is a woman’s name, and in French should be Jeanne. 😉
So, if I’m writing in English about the former Prime Minister of Canada, I should call him “John Chrétien” and not “Jean Chrétien”?
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### Author:  [@Arnold\_Winkelried](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Arnold_Winkelried)
#### Post date: [August 20, 2010, 6:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-translation-question-subjunctive-related/550882/5 "2010-08-20T18:04:44Z")
No, you should call him John Christian!
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### Author:  [@Gymnopithys](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gymnopithys)
#### Post date: [August 20, 2010, 8:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-translation-question-subjunctive-related/550882/6 "2010-08-20T20:10:50Z")
"I want Jean to have opened the door.
Je veux que Jean ait ouvert la porte. "
Nope. Even English does not sound right. I think it should be _I wanted Jean to have opened the door_.
The correct translation is:
_J’aurais voulu que Jean ouvre la porte._
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### Author:  [@Kobal2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kobal2)
#### Post date: [August 20, 2010, 8:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-translation-question-subjunctive-related/550882/7 "2010-08-20T20:21:08Z")
> [@Gymnopithys](#):
>
> "I want Jean to have opened the door.
> Je veux que Jean ait ouvert la porte. "
>
> Nope. Even English does not sound right. I think it should be _I wanted Jean to have opened the door_.
>
> The correct translation is:
>
> _J’aurais voulu que Jean ouvre la porte._
Not necessarily - you simply have to think of “want” as “wish”. “I want John to have opened the door” is equivalent to “I wish John had opened the door”, the problem being that the grammar construct is different in English (but not in French : “je souhaite que Jean ait ouvert la porte”).
Your example is the translation of “I wished John would open the door” or “would have opened the door”, which is not the same. It isn’t even in the same time frame, since now the principal clause is in the past as well.
Not that the actual sentence used matters - as I understand it, the OP merely wanted to know if the simple past subjunctive was the correct form for a present wish that something had happened in the past, which it is.
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### Author:  [@Hypnagogic\_Jerk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hypnagogic_Jerk)
#### Post date: [August 20, 2010, 8:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-translation-question-subjunctive-related/550882/8 "2010-08-20T20:49:20Z")
Yes, the problem is the second case isn’t that it’s grammatically incorrect, but rather that it’d be more obvious with the subordinate clause explicitely there. Compare:
I want Jean to have opened the door when I’ll be back.
Je veux que Jean ait ouvert la porte quand je serai de retour.
There’s nothing wrong with any of these sentences.
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### Author:  [@sundog66](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sundog66)
#### Post date: [August 20, 2010, 9:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-translation-question-subjunctive-related/550882/9 "2010-08-20T21:30:10Z")
Thanks everyone for the responses. **Kobal2** is right that with the second example, I’m specifically interested in the way you express a present desire about a (possibly hypothetical) past action. And I think **Hypnagogic Jerk** is right that extra context makes it sound better.
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### Author:  [@Kobal2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kobal2)
#### Post date: [August 20, 2010, 11:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-translation-question-subjunctive-related/550882/10 "2010-08-20T23:58:49Z")
> [@Hypnagogic\_Jerk](#):
>
> Yes, the problem is the second case isn’t that it’s grammatically incorrect, but rather that it’d be more obvious with the subordinate clause explicitely there. Compare:
>
> I want Jean to have opened the door when I’ll be back.
> Je veux que Jean ait ouvert la porte quand je serai de retour.
>
> There’s nothing wrong with any of these sentences.
Nitpick, but if there’s a thread to be a grammar Nazi this is it : when I’m back, not when I’ll be back.
Other than that, spot on.
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### Author:  [@Waffle\_Decider](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Waffle_Decider)
#### Post date: [August 21, 2010, 12:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-translation-question-subjunctive-related/550882/11 "2010-08-21T00:46:04Z")
> [@Giles](#):
>
> > [@Arnold\_Winkelried](#):
> >
> > Except that Jean is a woman’s name, and in French should be Jeanne. 😉
>
> So, if I’m writing in English about the former Prime Minister of Canada, I should call him “John Chrétien” and not “Jean Chrétien”?
It’s Jean Poutine.
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### Author:  [@Hypnagogic\_Jerk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hypnagogic_Jerk)
#### Post date: [August 21, 2010, 6:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-translation-question-subjunctive-related/550882/12 "2010-08-21T06:49:15Z")
> [@Kobal2](#):
>
> Nitpick, but if there’s a thread to be a grammar Nazi this is it : when I’m back, not when I’ll be back.
“When I’m back” is certainly correct, and I’d say it sounds better, but is “when I’ll be back” really _in_correct?
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### Author:  [@Kobal2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kobal2)
#### Post date: [August 21, 2010, 7:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-translation-question-subjunctive-related/550882/13 "2010-08-21T07:41:37Z")
I believe so, yes, but I’m having the devil of a time trying to root out an authoritative cite. The best my Google-Fu can muster right now is [this page](http://www.englishpage.com/verbpage/simplefuture.html). I’ll defer to our resident ObersturmGrammarians for more exhaustive info on the subject :).
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### Author:  [@sundog66](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sundog66)
#### Post date: [August 21, 2010, 1:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-translation-question-subjunctive-related/550882/14 "2010-08-21T13:00:47Z")
> [@Kobal2](#):
>
> I believe so, yes, but I’m having the devil of a time trying to root out an authoritative cite. The best my Google-Fu can muster right now is [this page](http://www.englishpage.com/verbpage/simplefuture.html). I’ll defer to our resident ObersturmGrammarians for more exhaustive info on the subject :).
Well, I can provide a descriptively oriented cite on the matter.
[QUOTE=Cambridge Grammar of English Language, p. 191]
_‘When’_ adjuncts and the complements of temporal prepositions such as _‘after’_, _‘before’_, _‘as soon as’_, etc., take the simple present, not the _‘will’_ construction, when the reference is to future time …
i. I’ll buy one when the price comes / \*will come down.
…
Here I do not **assert** that the price will come down … but simply take the occurrence of [this event] for granted. The modal qualification which _‘will’_ conveys (in varying degrees) would therefore be out of place: the grammar requires the unmodalised forms.
[/QUOTE]
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### Author:  [@Gymnopithys](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gymnopithys)
#### Post date: [August 22, 2010, 7:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-translation-question-subjunctive-related/550882/15 "2010-08-22T19:04:05Z")
> [@Hypnagogic\_Jerk](#):
>
> Yes, the problem is the second case isn’t that it’s grammatically incorrect, but rather that it’d be more obvious with the subordinate clause explicitely there. Compare:
>
> I want Jean to have opened the door when I’ll be back.
> Je veux que Jean ait ouvert la porte quand je serai de retour\*.
>
> There’s nothing wrong with any of these sentences.
\*C’est ce qu’on appelle du “petit nègre”.
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### Author:  [@Hypnagogic\_Jerk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hypnagogic_Jerk)
#### Post date: [August 23, 2010, 4:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-translation-question-subjunctive-related/550882/16 "2010-08-23T04:28:31Z")
To **sundog66** : thanks!
To **Gymnopithys** : how so?
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### Author:  [@Gymnopithys](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gymnopithys)
#### Post date: [August 23, 2010, 4:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-translation-question-subjunctive-related/550882/17 "2010-08-23T16:12:32Z")
> [@Hypnagogic\_Jerk](#):
>
> To **sundog66** : thanks!
> To **Gymnopithys** : how so?
_Je veux que Jean ait ouvert la porte quand je serai de retour_.
You are speaking in the present tense to express in the future something that is past. The tense concordance is grammatically incorrect. I suggest a better (and only) translation:
_Je veux que Jean ait la porte ouverte_ (quand je serai de retour).
_qu’il ait ouvert la porte_ is imperfect subjunctive.
_qu’il ait la porte ouverte_ is present subjunctive and agrees with _je veux_.
(time zone is cause for the laps…)
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### Author:  [@Gymnopithys](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gymnopithys)
#### Post date: [August 23, 2010, 4:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-translation-question-subjunctive-related/550882/18 "2010-08-23T16:28:07Z")
correction: lapse, not laps…
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### Author:  [@Hypnagogic\_Jerk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hypnagogic_Jerk)
#### Post date: [August 23, 2010, 6:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-translation-question-subjunctive-related/550882/19 "2010-08-23T18:05:34Z")
> [@Gymnopithys](#):
>
> _Je veux que Jean ait ouvert la porte quand je serai de retour_.
>
> You are speaking in the present tense to express in the future something that is past. The tense concordance is grammatically incorrect. I suggest a better (and only) translation:
>
> _Je veux que Jean ait la porte ouverte_ (quand je serai de retour).
Is there any grammatical difference between these two sentences? You replace “ait ouvert la porte” by “ait la porte ouverte”. You just put the complement between the auxiliary and past participle instead of after the verb, but it’s still past subjunctive.
Unless you intend the verb to be _avoir_ instead of _ouvrir_, with _ouverte_ acting as an adjective, as in the difference between these two sentences:
Je veux qu’il ait chauffé un coussin quand je serai de retour.
Je veux qu’il ait un coussin chaud quand je serai de retour.
But in any case, “je veux que Jean ait la porte ouverte” sounds strange; I’m not sure it’s even correct. What we could say is “je veux que Jean **tienne** la porte ouverte.” But then it refers to a continued action, not to a specific action in time that happens between now and my return.
> [@](#):
>
> _qu’il ait ouvert la porte_ is imperfect subjunctive.
No, it’s past subjunctive.
> [@](#):
>
> _qu’il ait la porte ouverte_ is present subjunctive and agrees with _je veux_.
>
> (time zone is cause for the laps…)
I tried to find an online French grammar to check out the rules about tense agreement. [This source](http://www.etudes-litteraires.com/concordance-des-temps.php) says that past subjunctive in the subordinate clause may describe an action posterior to the action in the main clause, with the example “je souhaite qu’elle ait fini demain.” This example seems to agree with mine.
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### Author:  [@Gymnopithys](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gymnopithys)
#### Post date: [August 23, 2010, 7:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-translation-question-subjunctive-related/550882/20 "2010-08-23T19:21:46Z")
_Is there any grammatical difference between these two sentences? You replace “ait ouvert la porte” by “ait la porte ouverte”. You just put the complement between the auxiliary and past participle instead of after the verb, but it’s still past subjunctive._
There certainly is a difference. Like you say:
\*Unless you intend the verb to be avoir instead of ouvrir, with ouverte acting as an adjective, as in the difference between these two sentences:
Je veux qu’il ait chauffé un coussin quand je serai de retour.
Je veux qu’il ait un coussin chaud quand je serai de retour.
\*
That’s my intended meaning.
On the other hand _je veux que Jean ait la porte ouverte_ isn’t strange if you want to convey the idea contained in _je veux que Jean ait ouvert la porte._ It’s the subtlety of translation. But perhaps being francophone I perceive it differently. I still maintain que _je veux qu’il ait ouvert_ or \*je veux qu’il ait chauffé \*are incorrect.
OK for past subjunctive, not imperfect.
A bon entendeur…
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