Voted Best Answer
Dec 14, 2012 - 04:49 AM
Hi guys, I'm afraid GoogleTranslate is not on top of that one ;)
"Tu n'as presque travaillé" is incorrect in French, it doesn't mean anything, to say: "You almost worked" or "You've almost worked", it's: "Tu as presque travaillé", there isn't any negation, neither in French nor in English in this case.
Yet, the absence of "pas" in the example you mention doesn't come from the verb or from the adverb "presque", they have nothing to do with your issue..
that's because to make a negative statement in French, you always need "ne" + the other part of the negation, which can be: pas, plus, jamais, rien... :
ne ... pas = not
ne ... plus = not ... anymore
ne ... jamais = never
ne ... rien = not ... anything
Etc etc
To make a negative statement, you use only ONE of these, using two would be redundant, which is why you can't say "ne pas plus" as you suggested, it's either ne pas, or ne plus, according to the meaning you want. For example:
Je ne veux pas manger = I don't want to eat
Je ne veux plus manger = I don't want to eat anymore
Je ne veux jamais manger = I never want to eat
Je ne veux rien manger = I don't want to eat anything
I hope this helps!
"Tu n'as presque travaillé" is incorrect in French, it doesn't mean anything, to say: "You almost worked" or "You've almost worked", it's: "Tu as presque travaillé", there isn't any negation, neither in French nor in English in this case.
Yet, the absence of "pas" in the example you mention doesn't come from the verb or from the adverb "presque", they have nothing to do with your issue..
that's because to make a negative statement in French, you always need "ne" + the other part of the negation, which can be: pas, plus, jamais, rien... :
ne ... pas = not
ne ... plus = not ... anymore
ne ... jamais = never
ne ... rien = not ... anything
Etc etc
To make a negative statement, you use only ONE of these, using two would be redundant, which is why you can't say "ne pas plus" as you suggested, it's either ne pas, or ne plus, according to the meaning you want. For example:
Je ne veux pas manger = I don't want to eat
Je ne veux plus manger = I don't want to eat anymore
Je ne veux jamais manger = I never want to eat
Je ne veux rien manger = I don't want to eat anything
I hope this helps!