Imperfect Subjunctive as a Politeness Softener

In almost every language, the grammar of politeness is the grammar of distancing: you step back from the directness of a command and reach for tenses or forms that sound further away from the here-and-now. English uses would you, could you, might I. French has voudriez-vous, pourriez-vous. Portuguese has several softeners, but one of them stands apart as uniquely Portuguese: the imperfect subjunctive in a main clause, as in quisesse o senhor seguir-me ("would the gentleman care to follow me"). This page is about that quietly remarkable construction — where it comes from, when it is used, and how to situate it against the more common polite forms that most learners already know.

This is a small topic in terms of frequency, but a rich one in terms of register. Getting it right marks you as a careful, attentive speaker of European Portuguese. Getting it wrong is harmless but misses one of the language's most elegant gestures.

What "imperfect subjunctive as softener" actually means

The normal home of the imperfect subjunctive is a subordinate clause: se tivesse tempo (if I had time), queria que viesses (I'd like you to come). In those contexts, it is doing its usual job as the past-shifted / unreal counterpart of the present subjunctive.

But Portuguese allows a handful of imperfect subjunctive forms to appear as the only verb in a main clause, used as an extreme politeness softener for requests and offers. The form that does this most often is quisesse (from querer), with pudesse (from poder) close behind, and tivesse appearing in a few fixed phrases.

The effect is a step beyond "would you" — closer to English "if you would be so kind as to" or "might it please the sir to." It sounds slightly formal, slightly ceremonious, and deeply polite. In modern European Portuguese it occupies a specific register niche: formal writing, certain service contexts (upscale hotels, fine dining, old-school commerce), and older speakers.

The logic of distancing

Why does the imperfect subjunctive sound polite? The same reason could sounds more polite than can in English: the speaker is reaching for a form that is grammatically distant from present reality. The imperfect subjunctive is the mood/tense of unreal, hypothetical, or past-shifted events — it is by design far from direct assertion. Using it in a main clause to make a request says, in effect, "I am not demanding; I am gently hovering over the possibility of the thing I want."

This is the same logic that lets the imperfect indicative stand in for the conditional in polite speech (queria for quereria, see imperfect for politeness). But the imperfect subjunctive goes one step further: it is not just past-shifted, it is mood-shifted into irrealis. That extra distance is what makes it register as super-polite.

Quisesse — the main form you will meet

Quisesse is the imperfect subjunctive of querer. In everyday Portuguese you meet it in se ele quisesse (if he wanted to), queria que quisesses (I wanted you to want to). But in its politeness use, it leads a main clause and introduces an infinitive or que-clause naming the requested action.

Notice the inversion: quisesse o senhor rather than o senhor quisesse. This is a stylistic marker of the construction — fronting the verb gives the sentence a slightly archaic, almost petitioning quality, reminiscent of the older Portuguese of formal correspondence and court speech.

The subject is almost always o senhor, a senhora, os senhores, or as senhoras — the most formal second-person references Portuguese offers. Using quisesse você or quisesse tu would be tonally wrong; the whole point of the construction is high formality.

Pudesse — "would that I could"

Pudesse works the same way, but its meaning centres on ability rather than willingness. The phrase pudesse eu... is typically a half-wishful, half-polite offer of help or expression of regret.

The first two are half-wish, half-offer; the third is a genuine polite request. In all three the imperfect subjunctive in a main clause softens the directness of the desire.

Tivesse in fixed politeness phrases

The imperfect subjunctive of ter turns up mostly in fixed phrases of extreme courtesy. The most common pattern is tivesse a bondade de / tivesse a amabilidade de + infinitive.

These are set collocations. Outside of ter a bondade de / ter a amabilidade de, bare tivesse is uncommon as a politeness marker in EP.

Contrast with the much more common polite forms

None of the imperfect subjunctive softeners is the first choice in everyday polite speech. For 95% of situations, European Portuguese uses simpler softeners. It is worth laying them out so you can calibrate when to reach for the elevated version.

Note the escalating ceremony. A waiter in a neighbourhood café will say o senhor deseja? or just faz favor?. A head waiter at a Michelin-starred restaurant might say quisessem os senhores acompanhar-me à vossa mesa. The difference is not the grammatical correctness — both are correct — but the register signal.

"Se fizesse o favor de" — the halfway house

One more construction deserves its own note: se fizesse o favor de + infinitive. Structurally it is an if-clause with the imperfect subjunctive, but pragmatically it functions as an extremely polite request. It sits between plain faça o favor de (imperative + infinitive) and the fully ceremonious quisesse o senhor.

The tu version of this — se fizesses o favor — is occasionally heard between friends as a joking mock-formality. In actual formal speech, it is always se fizesse (addressing o senhor / a senhora) or se fizessem (plural).

Where you will actually hear the elevated forms

Let's be realistic. You are unlikely to hear quisesse o senhor on a Lisbon tram or in a Porto bar. The construction survives in specific habitats:

• Formal written correspondence: legal letters, official notices, ceremonial invitations.
• Upscale service industries: high-end restaurants, luxury hotels, first-class travel staff, older establishments that prize traditional hospitality language.
• Institutional announcements: airport boarding calls, theatre announcements, some broadcasts.
• Literary and theatrical dialogue: historical novels, period dramas, stage plays set in formal settings.
• Speech by older educated speakers: some speakers over about sixty, especially in professions like law or medicine, still use these forms spontaneously.

To younger European Portuguese speakers (say, under forty), the full quisesse o senhor construction can sound slightly archaic or even comically formal. They will understand it perfectly, but will rarely produce it. This is worth knowing: being able to recognise these forms is important; producing them in casual speech would be misplaced.

A dialogue sample: the register staircase

To see the politeness levels in action, here is the same underlying request — asking a customer to follow to their table — at five different registers.

The grammatical content is identical. The register signal ranges from tram-conductor blunt to grand-hotel-ceremonious. Native speakers slide up and down this staircase based on the setting, the relationship, and the level of deference they want to display.

Comparison with English

English does not have a close analogue. The imperfect subjunctive in a main clause has no English equivalent because English subjunctive forms are largely dead. The closest English comes is:

English does this work with modal verbs (would, might, could, should) plus a fixed politeness phrase ("be so kind as to," "if you would"). Portuguese folds the distancing into the verb morphology itself.

A note to Spanish-speaking learners

If you speak Spanish, you know the Spanish imperfect subjunctive (quisiera, pudiera) works similarly as a politeness softener: quisiera un café (I'd like a coffee). That construction is alive and well in Spanish. Portuguese does use quisera (with one s, no stress shift) similarly, but in modern EP the more common politeness forms are queria (imperfect indicative for conditional) and gostaria / gostava. Do not assume the Spanish quisiera maps directly onto a common EP form — it maps best onto quisera (standalone wish, see wishes-past), which sounds more literary than everyday.

Common Mistakes

Pick the register. Tu is intimate; quisesse + o senhor is ceremonious. Mixing them is like addressing your best friend as "Your Excellency."

Queria doesn't take a reflexive-style pronoun for the speaker. Just queria um café.

The main verb is pudesse. What comes after is a plain infinitive, not another subjunctive.

Fazer o favor requires de before the infinitive: fazer o favor *de fazer X*. It is an obligatory preposition, easy to forget.

The quisesse + subject construction is framed as a respectful statement, not an interrogation. A written question mark changes the tone unpleasantly. If you want a clear yes/no question in polite register, use poderia or podia: Poderia ajudar-me?

Ter a bondade / ter a amabilidade requires de before the following infinitive.

Key takeaways

• The imperfect subjunctive in a main clause is a distinctively Portuguese politeness softener. Quisesse o senhor seguir-me = "would the gentleman kindly follow me."
• It works by distancing — pulling the verb into irrealis for maximum courtesy. The same logic underlies English might, would, could, but Portuguese folds the distancing into the verb form itself.
• The main forms are quisesse, pudesse, tivesse. Quisesse + o senhor / a senhora is the most productive pattern.
• The register is ceremonious, slightly archaic-sounding to younger speakers. Found in upscale service, formal correspondence, institutional announcements, and older educated speech.
• In everyday polite speech, queria, gostava / gostaria, podia / poderia, and se fizesse o favor de are far more common. Learn those first; recognise the elevated forms.
• Se fizesse o favor de + infinitive is the useful halfway house: formal but not archaic, common in real service contexts.

Next, see polite requests with the conditional for the full picture of courteous request grammar, and imperfect for politeness for the everyday queria / podia shift.