Imparfait? Why are you using devient?

Tracy S.A1Kwiziq community member

Imparfait? Why are you using devient?

Why are you devient? As in, elle devient une star... Devient seems to be the present tense of devenir; shouldn't you be using the imparfait?

Merci

Tracy

This question relates to:French interactive reading exercise "Édith Piaf (Portraits français)"

Reading B1, Famous People, Music, Listening or Seeing B1

Asked 4 years ago

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Chris W.C1 Kwiziq Q&A super contributor

You'll notice that the entire paragraph and following ones are in present tense. This is a stylistic means to draw the reader into the story. The same is possible in English as well, by the way, even if not used as commonly as in French.

Like04 years ago

Maarten K.C1 Kwiziq Q&A super contributor

That there is a difference in approaches to 'tense' in writing formal historical articles between French and English is noted in the text preceding the article, and a link to the more detailed description is given:

https://www.lawlessfrench.com/grammar/historical-tenses/

Like04 years ago

Tracy S. asked:View original