Curious about whether theses verbs would be imperfect or preterite.
They arrived right away.
Yesterday the teacher was very angry.
Tony and Ana were in love.
2 Answers
I'll take a crack at this. You may want to wait for advice from a native speaker.
They arrived right away.
Definitely preterite. It was a specific event. They came, your'e not talking about the process of them coming...they just came. The only situation in which this could be impefect is if you meant something like this: The always used to be punctual. The arrived right away. Now they're always late. Here "The arrived right away" could have been written as "They used to arrive right away."
Yesterday the teacher was very angry.
Generally imperfect, particularly if you go on to describe some specific events that occurred while she was angry which would go in the preterite. However, if you want to convey that she was angry yesterday, but you witnessed the end of her anger, or you saw her today and she is no longer angry then you could you the preterite. The preterite conveys a sense that the anger has finished. Imperfect conveys that she was angry, you don't know if she is still angry, you don't care whether she is still angry because you really want to talk more about some specific events, etc. The preterite would be quite rare in this instance, but possible.
Tony and Ana were in love.
Usually imperfect. But again, if you wanted to emphasize that they don't love each other anymore, they have different lovers now, they are divorced now, etc. then preterite could be used. Conversely, here is a little paragraph full of imperfect verbs in Spanish. Tony and Ana were in love. They used to go everywhere together. They were best friends, too. The were always hugging and kissing each other, even in public. etc. Every one of these verbs would be in the imperfect, even the actions because they occurred over an indefinite time...they were habitual.
Many times there is a clear choice between imperfect and preterite. Many times there is not and it comes down to the attitude of the speaker regarding the thing that he is telling you. One-time events and events that have a definite end during the time frame of the story usually go in the preterite and past feelings usually go in the imperfect unless you are emphasizing a sudden change in a feeling (emphasizing the beginning of it) or you want to emphasize that the feeling reached an end. Feelings normally are in the imperfect if they are just background for the rest of your story and you want to emphasize the actual events that took place.
They arrived right away.
If it was on a certain time, day or date. "llegaron" or "arribaron"
If it was a repeated action in the past. "llegaban" or "arribaban"
Yesterday the teacher was very angry. "estaba" muy enojado or enfadado.
Tony and Ana were in love.
Mostly "estaban" muy enamorados. Sometimes maybe to emphasize their love is past and over ·" estuvieron" but as I said before mainly "estaban"
