If you like starting your week by learning a French word, you’re in the right place! In today’s blog, we’re studying the verb finir.
You can listen to its pronunciation in the audio clip below:
While this verb is extremely useful and very common in French, it has a fairly simple translation at its core. Finir means ‘to finish’ or ‘to end’.
Continuing on our theme of simplicity, the grammar is also quite easy to get to grips with. As finir is a regular –ir verb, you won’t need to learn any special conjugations. But if you need a refresher, visit our Easy Learning French Grammar pages for all the information on conjugating regular -ir verbs in the:
So, why have we picked this for our word of the week if it’s so straightforward? Firstly, finir can be used both transitively and intransitively.
For its transitive use, this means the subject needs a direct object for finir to make sense. In this, the verb will take avoir in compound tenses:
Nous avons fini les devoirs. We’ve finished our homework.
Est-ce que vous finissez cette peinture ? Are you finishing this painting?
On doit finir la soupe avant de commander un dessert. We need to finish the soup before ordering dessert.
More commonly, finir is used intransitively – in other words, the subject is doing the action of ‘finishing or ‘ending’. Let’s take a look at some examples:
Suivez le chemin qui finit à la forêt. Follow the path that ends at the forest.
Le film finira vers minuit. The film will finish around midnight.
Après vingt ans à la télé, notre émission préférée est finie. After 20 years on TV, our favourite programme is over / has ended.
But more than anything, understanding finir is so useful because of the variety of everyday set phrases and expressions where it appears:
finir par (faire) to end up (doing)
J’ai fini par me plaindre de nos conditions de travail. I ended up complaining about our working conditions.
finir en beauté to end on a high
mal finir; finir mal to end badly
Franchement, je crois que ça va mal finir. Honestly, I think that it’s going to end badly.
finir de (faire) to stop/finish (doing)
Finissez de vous disputer ! Stop arguing!
à n’en plus finir endless; neverending
pour finir to end; finally
Et pour finir, veuillez lever vos verres à nos nouveaux collègues ! And finally, please raise your glasses to our new colleagues!
en finir avec to be done with/ to put an end to
« Tu t’entends bien avec ton ex-mari ? » « Pas du tout. J’en finis avec lui. » “Do you get on well with your ex-husband?” “Not at all. I’m done with him.”
That’s us finished for this week – we hope that you’ll come back for our next blog. Who knows, you might end up becoming a regular reader and learning a new word every week!
Written by Holly Tarbet, freelance copywriter and editor.
All opinions expressed on this blog are those of the individual writers, and do not necessarily reflect the opinions or policies of Collins, or its parent company, HarperCollins.
