Imperfect

The imperfect describes a past action as it was going on: in progress, repeated, or forming the background to something else. Where the simple past closes an event, the imperfect keeps it open. It is also the form the imperfect subjunctive and the conditional are built from, so it pays to learn it well.

How it is formed

Take the present indicative ju form, drop -ni to get the stem, and add the endings. The same endings serve classes 1 and 2:

unë	ti	ai, ajo	ne	ju	ata, ato
-ja	-je	-nte or -te	-nim	-nit	-nin

The third person singular ends in -nte after a vowel and -te after a consonant.

	Class 1 udhëtoj	Class 2 dal	Class 2 marr	Class 3 lë	Class 4 iki
unë	udhëtoja	dilja	merrja	lija	ikja
ti	udhëtoje	dilje	merrje	lije	ikje
ai, ajo	udhëtonte	dilte	merrte	linte	ikte
ne	udhëtonim	dilnim	merrnim	linim	iknim
ju	udhëtonit	dilnit	merrnit	linit	iknit
ata, ato	udhëtonin	dilnin	merrnin	linin	iknin

Look at the stems: dilja and not dalja, because the stem is taken from the ju form (dilni). A verb with a changed vowel in ju has it in every person of the imperfect. Likewise flas gives flisja, pres gives prisja, dua gives doja.

Class 5: the irregular imperfects

Among the irregular verbs, only jam, kam and them have imperfects of their own shape:

	jam	kam	them
unë	isha	kisha	thosha
ti	ishe	kishe	thoshe
ai, ajo	ishte	kishte	thoshte
ne	ishim	kishim	thoshim
ju	ishit	kishit	thoshit
ata, ato	ishin	kishin	thoshin

Class 6

The endings are the same. The -h- appears only if the present indicative has it, that is, after a vowel stem:

	gëzohem "rejoice"	nisem "depart"
unë	gëzohesha	nisesha
ti	gëzoheshe	niseshe
ai, ajo	gëzohej	nisej
ne	gëzoheshim	niseshim
ju	gëzoheshit	niseshit
ata, ato	gëzoheshin	niseshin

When to use it

1. An action in progress at a moment in the past

The imperfect shows what was going on, often as the setting for something else. With po it stresses that the action was just under way or about to happen:

Ata flinin kur erdha. "They were sleeping when I came."
Ai po lexonte kur hyra. "He was reading when I came in."

2. Repeated or habitual past actions

For something that happened again and again, the imperfect is used with an expression of repetition: çdo mëngjes "every morning", çdo ditë "every day", herë pas here "from time to time", ndonjëherë "sometimes":

Çdo mëngjes ngriheshim në orën gjashtë. "Every morning we got up at six."

3. Descriptions and long-lasting situations

Setting a scene, or describing how things used to be over an indefinite long period of time, takes the imperfect: how a region lived, what a place was like, what people did in a period.

4. Reporting what someone said or thought

After a past verb of saying or thinking, a present in the original words becomes an imperfect:

Ai tha se nuk donte të hante. "He said that he did not want to eat." The original words were "I do not want to eat".

5. Instead of the simple past of jam and kam

The imperfect of jam and kam is often used where a simple past would be expected: isha and kisha are far more common than qeshë and pata.

Imperfect or simple past? The difference is aspect, not time. Ai erdhi, hapi derën dhe hyri is a chain of finished events. Ata flinin kur erdha describes a state in progress. Use the simple past for what happened, the imperfect for what was happening.

The imperfect as a building block

Imperfect subjunctive: të + the imperfect, no new endings: të punoja. See Past subjunctives.
Conditional: do të + the imperfect: do të punoja "I would work". See Conditional.
Pluperfect: the imperfect of kam + the participle: kisha punuar. See Pluperfect.