When to use the Preterit and Imperfect form.
I've been struggling with this problem all the time. I have a hard time trying to understand when to use the preterit or imperfect form of a verb.
4 Answers
In addition to what Rogspax said, the difference between the two is the nuance that the speaker wants to create, ie "Fuiste el amor de mi vida." Here the speaker is conveying that she was the love of his life and now it is absolutely over. She came and went and left him no hope of ever having this again.
"Eras el amor de mi vida" tells us she was the love of his life, but nothing of an abrupt ending or not and that it was more like an unintrusive part of his life.
In cases of two or more actions happening in the past, imperfect indicates an ongoing action while within that time frame another action starts and finishes, ie: "Vine aquí a verte ayer pero no estabas" "I came here to see you yesterday but you were not here."
It's a tricky bit with Spanish, but super important, so read and practice it as much as you can. Some cases are pretty black and white, while others are a little more gray area, and can be either, just depending on the context, and what you're trying to convey.
There are a million ways to look at this, but what I'm using, as I practice is the following
Preterite is specific in time, and Imperfect is more vague.
Preterite: Clearly defined points or spans of time. Fully completed actions in the past. Sequences of the above. Sudden changes of state
Imperfect: Ongoing individual or simultaneous actions in the past, not well defined in time. Habitual / repeated actions in the past Time or descriptions in the past.
There's plenty more, and they can even be intermixed in the same sentence. (such as a specific action at a specific time (preterite) that happened during (interrupts) something that was ongoing (imperfect)
Hope that helps. Roger
Hi... Thanks for your question, which comes up quite often. Check out this link to learn all about the preterite vs. imperfect.
As well as the fine answers and links that you've already received, you may find this lesson helpful - Pret vs Imp
