Breakdown of L'homme à qui j'ai passé un appel a répondu.
l'homme
the man (m)
qui
who
répondre
to answer / to reply
l'appel
the call (m)
Questions & Answers about L'homme à qui j'ai passé un appel a répondu.
Where does the à in à qui come from?
It comes from the verb phrase passer un appel à quelqu'un (to make a call to someone). In French, you can never leave a preposition at the end of a sentence like we do in English with 'the man I made a call to'. You must put the preposition right before the relative pronoun. Since 'the man' is a person, we use qui, giving us à qui (literally 'to whom').
Why use passé instead of fait for 'made' a call?
Since qui is before the verb, why doesn't passé need to agree with it?
In the passé composé with avoir, the past participle only agrees with a direct object that comes before the verb. Here, à qui is an indirect object because of the preposition à. The direct object is un appel (the thing being made), which comes after the verb. Therefore, passé stays in its default masculine singular form.
Why is a répondu all the way at the end of the sentence?
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