Breakdown of El director del circo le pidió a la acróbata que saltase.
de
of
a
personal a (marks a person object)
que
that (relative pronoun, conjunction)
le
to him / to her / to you (formal) / him (direct object, male person)
el director
the director / the head teacher
pedir
to ask for; to order (food or drink)
saltar
to jump
el circo
the circus
la acróbata
the acrobat
Questions & Answers about El director del circo le pidió a la acróbata que saltase.
Why does the Spanish sentence use que saltase instead of the infinitive saltar like in English ("to jump")?
In Spanish, when you ask, tell, or want someone else to do something, you cannot use the infinitive. Because the director is asking the acrobat to do the jumping, there is a change of subject. Therefore, you must use que followed by a conjugated verb in the subjunctive mood.
Why is saltase in the past (imperfect) subjunctive instead of the present subjunctive?
The tense of the subjunctive verb depends on the main verb. Because the director's request happened in the past (pidió, which is the preterite tense), the following subjunctive verb must also be in the past tense (saltase). If he were asking right now (pide), you would use the present subjunctive (que salte).
How is the form saltase created, and is it different from saltara?
To form it, take the third-person plural of the preterite (saltaron), drop the -ron, and add the -se endings (here, just -se for the third-person singular form). Saltase and saltara mean exactly the same thing. In Spain, you will hear both forms, though the -se endings are slightly more formal or literary.
Why do we have both le and a la acróbata in the sentence if they refer to the same person?
This is a common Spanish feature called indirect object doubling. Even when you specifically state who is receiving the action (a la acróbata), it is standard and often required to also include the matching indirect object pronoun (le) right before the verb.
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