Is Preterite Ever Used In the Progressive Form?
Lo siento, amigos, this probably is a silly question but I'm just not sure.
I know about the present progressive (ejemplo: Yo estoy hablando a mi amiga.) I know about the imperfect progressive (ejemplo: Nosotros estabámos corriendo cuando él caía.)
Would there ever be a case when you would use it in the preterite...(such as Ella estuvo leyendo ayer.)?
Thanks for all of your help, everyone!
9 Answers
Would there ever be a case when you would use it in the preterite...(such as Ella estuvo leyendo ayer.)?
Of course, and your example is perfect Spanish:
Ayer leyó un libro. - She read the book... and finished it (leyó is preterite).
Ayer estuvo leyendo un libro. - She read for some time, and then stopped (estuvo is preterite), but we do not know whether she finished reading her book, though (leyendo is progressive).
Ayer estaba leyendo... - She was in the middle of the "reading" (leyendo is progressive)... when probably something happened, because the sentence sounds incomplete as it is. We do not know how the story ends (estaba is imperfect) or even if it does end.
By the way, Spanish subject pronouns (yo, él, nosotras...) in Spanish are used for contrastive and emphatic uses, so you can't use them all the time... unless you mean to say "I, myself, and no one else" dozens of times per minute. The effect you'd achieve lies somewhere between stammering and speaking in a paranoid manner, i.e. it sounds like very bad Spanish.
Hola, Paz,
Without going into a great deal of explanation, and just to answer your question with the sentence you used,
The preterite in general is used to describe an action that occurred and was completed.
One of the uses of the imperfect is to describe actions that do not have a defined ending and are or were ongoing for a while.
Therefore the action of reading was ongoing for some unknown period of time, and you would say "estaba leyendo".
and there are no stupid grammatical questions when you are learning a new language!
With progressive tenses, you use estar + a gerund.
Oops, careful on this, for
English gerund ? Spanish gerundio.
This has been explained very eloquently by samdie and lazarus in some of the older threads about gerunds and participles.
Help with phrasing using "Gerund"?
What is the difference between English gerund and Spanish gerundio?
These are just 3 links (there are probably 20-odd more) but I believe they'll be more than enough.
This article contains several example sentences using the preterite progressive tense.
This article discusses using verbs of motion, seguir and continuar to form the progressive tense.
In the fatchocobo's example sentence fue is from the verb Ir (verb of motion), not ser.
va mejorando le da un matiz más lento, algo sucede paulatinamente, con trabajo, y culminará. [true for ir+any gerundio]
With progressive tenses, you use estar + a gerund. Yes, you can use the preterite tense with progressive -ando or -iendo verbs.
Present tense - Estoy comiendo pescado. Estoy nadando en el río.
Preterite tense - Estuve comiendo pescado. Estuve nadando en el río.
Imperfect tense - Estaba comiendo pescado. Estaba nadando en el río.
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After reading this I found an interesting example in a spanish book I am reading. The sentence goes like this. "Mi voz fue adquiriendo un tono de entusiasmo creciente." My voice was acquiring a tone that was increasingly enthusiastic. Unfortunately I can't explain why "fue" was used here. It is an example of preterite being used in the progressive though.
Great question, great and useful answers -- and I'm saying so here to place this in "My Questions. . ."
Gracias, amigos! Excellent explanations! I really appreciate it.
