Word
Il ignorait la plainte du voisin depuis des mois.
Meaning
He had been ignoring the neighbor's complaint for months.
Part of speech
sentence
Pronunciation
Course
Breakdown of Il ignorait la plainte du voisin depuis des mois.
il
he
des
some (plural indefinite)
le voisin
the neighbor
du
of the / from the (masculine singular, with plural des)
Questions & Answers about Il ignorait la plainte du voisin depuis des mois.
Why is ignorait in the imparfait here, while the English translation uses "had been ignoring"?
In French, when an action started in the past and was still ongoing at a specific past moment, you use the imparfait with depuis. English uses the past perfect continuous ("had been doing"). Just like the present tense plus depuis means an action is still going on now, the imparfait plus depuis means it was still going on then.
Could I use the plus-que-parfait (il avait ignoré) instead to mean "he had been ignoring"?
I thought ignorer meant "to not know". Can it also mean "to ignore"?
Yes! While ignorer is a famous false friend that often means "to be unaware of", it can also mean "to ignore" when referring to intentionally disregarding a rule, a warning, or a complaint like la plainte. Note that if you are deliberately ignoring a person, it is usually more natural to use ne pas faire attention à.
Why do we use depuis here instead of pour if the English says "for months"?