Devoir imperfect or perfect

James W.C1Kwiziq Q&A regular contributor

I'm very confused with devoir and which tense to use now, as your lesson said devoir in imperfect meant "supposed to do" and perfect meant "had to do", yet you use the imperfect to say "had to do" here ? Can you please explain and also explain what that lesson actually means as it doesn't seem to be relevant?

This question relates to:French writing exercise "My new flat [US: apartment]"

Freeform Writing Exercise B1

Asked 3 years ago

Like0Answer1

Maarten K.C1 Kwiziq Q&A super contributor

James, I recently put this up to another question on devoir in past tenses. It may be helpful

https://french.kwiziq.com/questions/view/devait-or-a-du#AnswerAddForm

Like13 years ago

James W. asked:View original

Devoir imperfect or perfect

I'm very confused with devoir and which tense to use now, as your lesson said devoir in imperfect meant "supposed to do" and perfect meant "had to do", yet you use the imperfect to say "had to do" here ? Can you please explain and also explain what that lesson actually means as it doesn't seem to be relevant?

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