Question 1

Why does censée have an extra e?

Accepted Answer

The word censé acts as an adjective in the expression être censé. This means it must agree in gender and number with the subject of the sentence. Since the subject is the feminine Elle, we add an e to make it censée.

Question 2

Why is était in the imperfect tense here instead of the passé composé?

Accepted Answer

The imperfect is used because "being supposed to" do something describes an ongoing state or expectation in the past, rather than a single completed action. You will almost always use the imperfect (était censé) to translate "was supposed to", whereas the passé composé is used for the sudden, completed action that happened instead (l'a offensé).

Question 3

Why do we use the pronoun l' in elle l'a offensé instead of lui?

Accepted Answer

The verb offenser (to offend) takes a direct object, meaning there is no preposition like à after it. Therefore, we must use the direct object pronoun le (which contracts to l' before a vowel) to replace l'hôte. If the verb took an indirect object (like parler à), you would use lui.

Question 4

I've seen l'hôte used to mean "the guest". Is that right?

Accepted Answer

Yes! The French word hôte is a contronym, meaning it can refer to either the host or the guest. In this sentence, common sense tells us she is the guest thanking the host. If you want to be completely unambiguous when talking about a guest, you can use un invité instead.

Elle était censée remercier l'hôte, mais elle l'a offensé.

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