Conditional Parfait

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Permalink Reply by Frank on August 31, 2009 at 8:59pm

Hello Pam,

The correct one is the first one: "Ils auraient pu dire à quelqu'un".

There's a rule that says "quand deux verbes se suivent, le second est toujours à l'infinitif".

It applies here, because we have two verbs: "pouvoir" ("auraient pu") followed by "dire".

In such a case, the former follows traditional conjugation rules, and the later must be at the infinitive form.

The interrogative form is indeed "N'auraient-ils pas pu dire à quelqu'un ?" as you wrote. Bravo.

Now some nitpicking: "dire" is "to say". You can't "dire" without specifying what you are saying. If you say "Ils auraient pu dire à quelqu'un", it sounds as if the end of the sentence was missing. We're expecting something like "Ils auraient pu dire à quelqu'un qu'ils étaient perdus".

If you want to say "They could have told someone", you could:
- either use another verb that doesn't expect an object, like "Ils auraient pu prévenir quelqu'un", "N'auraient-ils pas pu prévenir quelqu'un ?"
- or add an object, like "Ils auraient pu le dire à quelqu'un", "N'auraient-ils pas pu le dire à quelqu'un ?"

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Permalink Reply by Pamela Kingfisher on September 1, 2009 at 5:01am

Thank you Frank!

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