57
Expressing desires and
preferences
This chapter covers the language associated with the concepts of desires and
preferences. As you will see from the examples below, some of the expressions used in
this context are similar to those in English, while others involve more complex
constructions which may require reference to Part A of this book.57.1 Expressing desires
To express desires, Spanish normally uses the following verbs and expressions:
querer‘to want’
gustar‘to like’
apetecer‘to be appealing to’, ‘to fancy’, ‘to feel like’
tener ganas de‘to feel like’
hacer ilusión‘to feel like’
desear‘to wish’57.1.1 Querer
Querer, ‘to want’, a radical-changing verb (e/ie), is probably the most frequent verb used
in the expression of desires, either present or past. It may be followed by a noun or
noun phrase (e.g. un café con leche, ‘a white coffee’), an infinitive (e.g. viajar, ‘to
travel’), a demonstrative pronoun (e.g.éste, ‘this one’), or it may be preceded by an
object pronoun (e.g. lo, ‘it’). To say what you want now, you can use:(a) The present tense, for example:
Por favor, quiero un café. I want a coffee, please.
Lo quiero con leche. I want it with milk.
Queremos viajar a Madrid. We want to travel to Madrid. 21.4 (p. 101); 16.1.2.1 (p. 64); 17.1 (p. 72)
(b) Quisiera
Sometimes, depending on the context, quiero, ‘I want’, or queremos, ‘we want’, may
sound a little abrupt, unless they are followed by the phrase por favor, with the proper
intonation of a request. To avoid sounding rude, you can use the more polite and
formal forms quisiera, ‘I’d like’, or quisiéramos, ‘we’d like’, for example: