Spanish: An Essential Grammar

For intended or expected actions

The imperfect is used to talk about actions or events that were intended or

expected to take place in the future:

Ese día llegaba Manolo. Manolo was arriving that day.

Pensaba que venías mañana. I thought you were coming

tomorrow.

To express politeness

The imperfect is commonly used to make a request or question appear less

direct:

Quería pedirle un favor. I wanted to ask you a favour.

Comparison between preterite and imperfect

The correct selection of tense poses a challenge for English speakers of

Spanish. This is due to the fact that Spanish can denote a different perspec-

tive by choosing one or other of the two tenses, whereas English uses a

single verb form for both. For example, where Spanish has no podía entrar

(often the first choice of English speakers) and no pude entrar, English has

‘I could not enter’.

With certain verbs the distinction between the preterite and the imperfect

is best illustrated by means of a direct comparison.

11.1.4

11.1.3.5

11.1.3.4

1111

2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

1011

1

12111

3 4 5 6 7 8 9

20111

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

30111

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

40

41111

11

Uses of
tenses

132

The imperfect and habitual actions

Sometimes the Spanish imperfect corresponds to English ‘would’: Por

las mañanas iba a correr en el parque ‘In the morning I would (=

‘used to’) go for a run in the park’.

Care should be taken with the word nunca‘never’. This can be a

frequency phrase [e.g. Nunca íbamos al cine ‘We would never (=

‘never used to’) go to the cinema’] but it can also be used to deny

that a particular action took place, in which case the preterite is

required: Yo nunca fui a su casa‘I never went to his house’.