Estar en el pretérito

Question

I tend to always use the imperfect past for 'estar', when maybe I should be using the preterit. To me 'estar' has a temporary feel to it, so the preterit doesn't seem to fit in my mind.

Any general guidelines for 'estar' in preterit form?

Answer 1

That's a tricky one, although many things expressed using estar do seem to have a temporary feel to them that isn't always the case - estar muerto (to be dead) for one

So rather than think of estar as being for temporary things perhaps you could think of it to describe states and conditions but ser for classifying, identifying or defining something.

As for the preterite, temporary or permanent, doesn't really come into it. In fact often it's the preterite that signals that a certain condition has already ended making it more temporary than estar which may mean in certain constructions that it's on going.

Eg: Mis niños estuvieron enfermos la semana pasada.? (the preterite indicates that now they're not sick anymore.)

Estaban enfermos la semana pasada. They were sick last week (but with the imperfect their recovery not indicated, they could still be sick.)

I hope that helps a little - you might find these lessons helpful. Ser vs Estar and Pret vs Imp

very nice. I'm not interpreting it correctly. Thanks for the new perspective. - lkelly, Apr 19, 2012