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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 December 2020
The distinction in use between the verbs ser and estar constitutes one of the thorniest points in Spanish grammar. It is not discussed in a thoroughgoing way in any treatise. Most of the native Spanish grammars, as Bello-Cuervo, are weak on this particular subject. Users of language are always guided primarily by instinct, not by rule, and we shall see that in the present case the instinct of Spaniards is delicate and especially difficult to reduce to formal law.
1 In the preparation of this article I have had the help and advice of my friend Dr. Robert K. Spaulding. Professors Clarence Paschall, E. C. Hills and C. C. Marden had the kindness to read the MS and offer some suggestions. For the convenience of the reader I have appended to the article a tabular summary of the contents with page references to the several sections.
2 The words “permanent,” “permanency” are most generally used in this connection. But strictly speaking, ser implies only “sensible duration,” not “indefinite duration” (=permanency).
3 W. I. Knapp, A Grammar of the Modern Spanish Language, 2 ed., Boston, 1910, p. 201.
4 Such are divertido, entendido, entretenido, pesado, reservado, sentido. A few examples: Era entendido en hierbas (Blasco, La barraca, VI); No sea usted pesado (Trigo, La primera conquista) ; Soy muy sentida ( =sensitive) (Frontaura, Memorialista; Las tiendas).
5 But cf. “el resto [de la ciudad] es callado, tranquilo, limpio, lleno de flores” (Martínez Sierra, Tú eres la paz, p. 268). In this sentence, which breaks custom in the case of each adjective, the durative condition is clearly emphasized.
6 Cf. I, ESTAR, B, 3, Remark. This sentence shows the correct idiom. In “¿Para cuándo están los imperios?” (Benavente, La gobernadora, I, 8) I see a contamination with such sentences as “No está el horno para bollos” (I, ESTAR, B, 3), and an example of the increasing use of estar.
7 See Cuervo, Apuntaciones criticas, §460, 2a. Such a sentence as “En este lugar fué donde le vi a usted” is sometimes, wrongly, rated a gallicism; as by Juan Cano, “Errores más comunes de Sintaxis española” (Hispania (Calif.) IV, 1921, p. 235).
8 Diez (Grammatik der Romanischen Sprachen, Bonn, 1872, III, p. 203) classified transitive verbs as perfective, “deren Thätigkeit entweder auf einen Moment eingeschränkt ist, wie in Ergreifen, Überraschen, Wecken, Überwinden, Verlassen, Endigen, Tödten, oder doch ein Endziel voraussetzt, wie in Machen, Herstellen, Schmücken, Bauen, Schlagen, Beladen”; their past participles “zeigen die Handlung als eine vollzogene, vollendete an”; and imperfective, as one which “eine Thätigkeit ausdrückt, welche nicht begonnen wird um vollendet zu werden, wie in Lieben, Hassen, Loben, Tadeln, Bewundern, Verlangen, Sehen, Hören und ähnlichen.” M. G. Cirot (op. cit., p. 61) would modify the definition of the imperfective verb to read, one which expresses “une action qui est toujours envisagée forcément en elle-même, et non dans ses suites, toujours en tant qu'imparfaite par conséquent.” If a verb used in the perfect tense does not imply the idea of any real result, it is an imperfective (p. 62). Cirot remarks also that verbs of seeing, hearing and asking ought not to be included in the list of imperfectives, while knowing (savoir, saber) should. The list is hard to establish precisely; I should not include in it conocer.
Hanssen (Gramática, §597) applies the words perfective and imperfective to estar and ser themselves. He mean, I take it, that past participles or adjectives when used with ser express an act or state continuing over a more or less indefinite period of time (“durative”), while with estar the act or state is definitely summed up and regarded as completed. I do not believe (nor, I judge, did Hanssen) that such a classification of ser and estar will serve in all cases.
Cirot's illuminating article should be consulted for further detail upon this section.
9 For fuller discussion and more examples see Hanssen, Gramática, §595, and especially La pasiva castellana, pp. 508-511.
10 See Cirot, op. cit., p. 66.
11 I shall not include here examples, which might be multiplied indefinitely, of past participles whose original verbal meaning has practically been lost sight of, like honrado, reservado, aficionado, enamorado, etc.; nor of those which, when used with ser, have an active sense, like cansado, pesado, divertido, confiado, determinado, etc. To the latter may be added this curious example: Creció el terror en todos, creídos que a la ruina del palacio seguiría la del torreón. Escalante, Ave Maris Stella, p. 359.
12 The examples from Escalante may with some reason be regarded as suspicious, for he writes with notably archaic diction.
13 Some examples and additional discussion may be found in Hanssen, La pasiva castellana, p. 109, Cirot, op. cit., p. 65, and Cirot, “Quelques remarques sur les archaïsmes de Mariana,” Rom. Forsch. XXIII, 902-904.
14 According to the rule given above, III, SER, A, Remark, soy muerto may not be the true passive in present time (=me matan, “they are killing me,” “I am being killed”).
15 Cirot (op. cit., 67-68) denies, in principle, that a past participle after estar may be assimilated to an adjective, and prefers to see a verbal use in all adjectives construed with estar. His reasoning appears to me oversubtle, and not confirmed by the facts. Most grammarians, as Maréca-Dubois, §259, take for granted the frequent adjectival use of the past participle with estar.
16 As with ser, examples of past participles with active meaning could be multiplied, as acertado, confiado, determinado, necesitado, etc.
17 M. Cirot (op. cit., p. 62) asserts that imperfective verbs may be conjugated with estar to denote “un état passif conçu comme nouveau par rapport à un état antérieur. ‘À présent je suis connu à Madrid’ se dira en espagnol ‘Ahora estoy conocido en Madrid,‘ et de même il se présentera des cas où il faudra dire estoy querido, estoy esperado.” I must say that I have found no clear example of an imperfective verb conjugated with estar, and that until convincing examples are offered, I doubt that a Spaniard would use the phrases cited. He would employ the verb in an active form—me quieren, se me quiere.
M. Cirot (p. 63) justly points out that the same concept (a passive state relatively novel) often explains the use of estar with a past participle where ser might be expected. See, e. g., the first sentence from Menéndez Pelayo under III, ESTAR, A.
18 Grammaire espagnole, Paris, 1889, §452.
19 Seguro está, impersonal, has always an ironic sense, and in practice one supplies a no in the dependent clause; or, when one is found there, it is cancelled. See Bello-Cuervo, §1141, and Hanssen, Gramática, §644.
20 Hills and Ford, A Spanish Grammar, §46, indicate that the meaning “disengaged” is always to be rendered with estar. They give ahora estoy libre as an example. But the cases I have cited from Bárbara and Los valientes prove that their statement is not entirely correct.
