Breakdown of J'ai expliqué que mon beau-frère cherchait du travail.
je
I
avoir
to have
chercher
to look for
mon
my (mon, ma, mes)
du
some (partitive, masculine)
le travail
the job
expliquer
to explain
que
that (introducing a clause)
le beau-frère
the brother-in-law
Questions & Answers about J'ai expliqué que mon beau-frère cherchait du travail.
Why is cherchait in the imparfait tense here instead of the présent?
This is the sequence of tenses in action! The original statement was in the present tense: "Il cherche du travail" (He is looking for work). Because you are reporting this using a past tense verb (J'ai expliqué), French grammar rules require you to shift that original present tense back to the imparfait (cherchait).
Could I use the passé composé (a cherché) for the second verb instead of the imparfait?
Can I drop the word que just like we drop "that" in English?
No. In English, we often drop "that" and simply say "I explained my brother-in-law was looking for work." In French, the conjunction que is strictly mandatory to connect the two parts of the sentence and can never be omitted.
Why is it du travail rather than un travail?
Travail (work) is usually treated as an uncountable noun, just like it is in English. We use the partitive article du (meaning "some") to express that he was looking for "some work." If you wanted to specifically say he was looking for "a job," you could say un travail or un emploi.
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