Breakdown of Qu'ils exécutent ma volonté !
ils
they (masculine/mixed)
mon
my (mon, ma, mes)
que
let / may (third-person command)
la volonté
the will
Questions & Answers about Qu'ils exécutent ma volonté !
Why does this command start with Qu'ils instead of just a verb?
French doesn't have a third-person imperative form to directly say "let them" or "may they" do something. Instead, you create a third-person command by using Que followed by a subject and the subjunctive mood. You can think of it as a shortened version of an unspoken order, like "I demand that they..." (J'exige qu'ils...).
Why does the subjunctive verb exécutent look exactly like the normal present tense here?
For regular -er verbs like exécuter, the third-person plural (ils/elles) is spelled exactly the same in both the present indicative and the present subjunctive. The commanding structure Qu'ils... at the beginning of the sentence is your primary clue that this is grammatically the subjunctive.
Does exécuter sound as violent as "to execute" does in English?
Is there a liaison between ils and exécutent?