Direction of accents

Brian E.C1Kwiziq Q&A regular contributor

Direction of accents

Looking at “Bien sûr, je préfèrerais que les animaux puissent vivre en liberté” I see that the “future stem” (not sure if this is the correct term) is “préfèrer…”, but in WordReference dictionary it is “préférer…”. Are both acceptable?
Asked 2 years ago
CélineKwiziq team memberCorrect answer

Bonjour Brian,

Maarten is correct that both spellings are acceptable.

Here are 2 extra links about the two conjugations of verbs similar to "préférer" in Le Futur Simple and in Le Conditionnel Présent:

Conjugate -éXer, -eXer, -eter, -eler verbs in the future tense in French (Le Futur Simple)

Conjugate most verbs in Le Conditionnel Présent (conditional mood)

I hope this is helpful. 

Bonne journée !

Maarten K.C1 Kwiziq Q&A super contributor

Both are acceptable - the version used here is from the rectifications distributed initially in 1991. Do you know the site Bescherelle - comprehensive list of verb conjugations in both traditional and rectified form ? https://bescherelle.com/conjugueur.php?term=Preferer

Brian E.C1Kwiziq Q&A regular contributor

Thanks Maarten, no, I wasn’t aware of that nor of Larousse, which I’ve noticed you reference before. They look like very authoritative resources, and I’ve saved the links. The only downsized being that the seem a little, well, intimidating? :) I think I’ll still primarily use word reference, Google translate, and Deepl for speed, but it’s great to be aware of these deeper resources.  Thanks!

Maarten K.C1 Kwiziq Q&A super contributor

Brian - neither is really intimidating. Bescherelle has other material but I mostly use it for the conjugation table and it is rare indeed to come across a verb not listed. Larousse comes as a bilingual form or straight French dictionary. The latter has more vocabulary overall, but the bilingual form covers a lot. However, advice from other French teaching sites and many 'polyglots' is to start using a fully French dictionary when you have pretty good comprehension - understanding around 70-80% of what you hear or read. Both available in free forms online !

Direction of accents

Looking at “Bien sûr, je préfèrerais que les animaux puissent vivre en liberté” I see that the “future stem” (not sure if this is the correct term) is “préfèrer…”, but in WordReference dictionary it is “préférer…”. Are both acceptable?

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