Spanish: An Essential Grammar

Notes: 1 The irregular forms in the singular are also adopted by verbs which are compounds of the above, such as detener (detén) ...

vivir viví vive dormir dormí duerme seguir seguí sigue tener tené ten decir decí di acostarse acostáte acuéstate María, vení lo ...

Suban ustedes al próximo Get on the next bus. autobús. Mis amigos, déjenlo aquí. [LA] My friends, leave it here. Negative comman ...

However, especially in informal speech this construction is replaced by ir a+ infinitive: Vamos a cenar en otro sitio. Let’s hav ...

The infinitive and the present and future tenses The infinitive is increasingly common to express commands in the form of notice ...

There are two verbs in Spanish equivalent to English ‘to be’, namely ser and estar. Unfortunately for the learner of Spanish, th ...

Ser to indicate the origin of persons or things Mi madre es de Brasil. My mother is from Brazil. Juan es andaluz. Juan is Andalu ...

Situations which demand estar To express location or position (whether temporary or permanent) Sus papeles estaban sobre la His ...

Estar + adjective Estar+ an adjective frequently denotes an accidental or temporary state. It is ‘to be’ by condition: Ana está ...

Adjectives which change their meaning with ser or estar Ser Estar cansado tiresome, tiring tired listo clever ready malo bad ill ...

increíble ‘to be incredible’ and, perhaps more surprisingly, ser feliz‘to be happy’ and ser desgraciado ‘to be unlucky/unhappy’ ...

Like the English words ‘to’, ‘from’, ‘after’, ‘with’, Spanish prepositions are used to link words and express a relationship bet ...

When the person is not known or is unspecific, the personal acan be omitted: Necesito jardinero. I need a gardener. Ese autobús ...

In addition, the personalais sometimes felt to be necessary to identify unambiguously the object of a verb, even if it is not a ...

Awith expressions of time and age A usually translates ‘at’ and ‘on’: Vino a las once y se fue al mediodía. He came at 11 o’cloc ...

El vino sabe a vinagre. The wine tastes like vinegar. Dejó atrás un fuerte olor a He left behind a strong smell of colonia. afte ...

(c) Ais used with many expressions that state location, for example: al aire libre in the open air al sol in the sun a la derech ...

Bajocan also be used literally of location, especially in a less restricted sense (e.g. ‘under the sun’), and also figuratively ...

Contra, en contra de Contraserves for most literal and figurative translations of ‘against’, and for firing weapons ‘at’. En con ...

De in geographical names la isla de Aruba the island of Aruba el camino de Machu Picchu the track to Machu Picchu De to state wh ...