Breakdown of Ne tire pas trop fort !
fort
strong
ne
not (used before the verb)
trop
too, too much
tirer
to pull
Questions & Answers about Ne tire pas trop fort !
Why is it tire and not tires since it's a command for 'you'?
Even though this is the tu (informal you) form of the verb tirer, French drops the final -s for all regular -er verbs when giving a command. So, tu tires becomes just tire ! The negative simply wraps it in ne ... pas.
Why does the sentence use fort (strong) instead of a word for 'hard'?
Would I also drop the -s if I gave a command using an irregular verb like mettre or écrire?
No, you only drop the -s in the tu command form for -er verbs like tirer. For irregular -re verbs like mettre and écrire, you keep the -s. For example, the command for 'put!' is mets !
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