paraître

See also: paraitre

French

Alternative forms

• paroître (Early Modern French, obsolete)
• paraitre (post-1990 spelling)

Etymology

Inherited from Middle French paroistre, from Old French paroistre, pareistre, from Vulgar Latin *pārēscere, from Latin pārēre.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /pa.ʁɛtʁ/

• audio

  (file)

Verb

paraître

1. to appear (become visible)

   Synonym: apparaître

   L’acteur parut sur l’écran. ― The actor appeared on screen.

2. to be published

   Synonym: être publié

   Ce texte est paru il y a longtemps. ― This text was published long ago.

   Le livre paraîtra en août. ― The book will be published in August.

3. to appear, to seem

   Synonym: sembler

   Il paraît avoir 40 ans. ― He seems forty (years old).

4. (impersonal, with que) to be said that, to be rumored that

   Il paraît que le vaccin fonctionne très bien. ― It is said that that the vaccine works very well.

Usage notes

• In the sense of to be published, this verb can take the verb être as the perfect auxiliary.

Conjugation

This verb is one of a fairly small group of -re verbs, that are all conjugated the same way. They are unlike other verb groups in that the 'i' is given a circumflex before a 't'.

Conjugation of paraître (see also Appendix:French verbs)

infinitive	simple	paraître
	compound	avoir or être + past participle
present participle or gerund1	simple	paraissant /pa.ʁɛ.sɑ̃/ or /pa.ʁe.sɑ̃/
	compound	ayant or étant + past participle
past participle		paru /pa.ʁy/
		singular			plural
		first	second	third	first	second	third
indicative		je (j’)	tu	il, elle, on	nous	vous	ils, elles
(simple tenses)	present	parais /pa.ʁɛ/	parais /pa.ʁɛ/	paraît /pa.ʁɛ/	paraissons /pa.ʁɛ.sɔ̃/ or /pa.ʁe.sɔ̃/	paraissez /pa.ʁɛ.se/ or /pa.ʁe.se/	paraissent /pa.ʁɛs/
	imperfect	paraissais /pa.ʁɛ.sɛ/ or /pa.ʁe.sɛ/	paraissais /pa.ʁɛ.sɛ/ or /pa.ʁe.sɛ/	paraissait /pa.ʁɛ.sɛ/ or /pa.ʁe.sɛ/	paraissions /pa.ʁɛ.sjɔ̃/ or /pa.ʁe.sjɔ̃/	paraissiez /pa.ʁɛ.sje/ or /pa.ʁe.sje/	paraissaient /pa.ʁɛ.sɛ/ or /pa.ʁe.sɛ/
	past historic2	parus /pa.ʁy/	parus /pa.ʁy/	parut /pa.ʁy/	parûmes /pa.ʁym/	parûtes /pa.ʁyt/	parurent /pa.ʁyʁ/
	future	paraîtrai /pa.ʁɛ.tʁe/ or /pa.ʁe.tʁe/	paraîtras /pa.ʁɛ.tʁa/ or /pa.ʁe.tʁa/	paraîtra /pa.ʁɛ.tʁa/ or /pa.ʁe.tʁa/	paraîtrons /pa.ʁɛ.tʁɔ̃/ or /pa.ʁe.tʁɔ̃/	paraîtrez /pa.ʁɛ.tʁe/ or /pa.ʁe.tʁe/	paraîtront /pa.ʁɛ.tʁɔ̃/ or /pa.ʁe.tʁɔ̃/
	conditional	paraîtrais /pa.ʁɛ.tʁɛ/ or /pa.ʁe.tʁɛ/	paraîtrais /pa.ʁɛ.tʁɛ/ or /pa.ʁe.tʁɛ/	paraîtrait /pa.ʁɛ.tʁɛ/ or /pa.ʁe.tʁɛ/	paraîtrions /pa.ʁɛ.tʁi.jɔ̃/ or /pa.ʁe.tʁi.jɔ̃/	paraîtriez /pa.ʁɛ.tʁi.je/ or /pa.ʁe.tʁi.je/	paraîtraient /pa.ʁɛ.tʁɛ/ or /pa.ʁe.tʁɛ/
(compound tenses)	present perfect	present indicative of avoir or être + past participle
	pluperfect	imperfect indicative of avoir or être + past participle
	past anterior2	past historic of avoir or être + past participle
	future perfect	future of avoir or être + past participle
	conditional perfect	conditional of avoir or être + past participle
subjunctive		que je (j’)	que tu	qu’il, qu’elle	que nous	que vous	qu’ils, qu’elles
(simple tenses)	present	paraisse /pa.ʁɛs/	paraisses /pa.ʁɛs/	paraisse /pa.ʁɛs/	paraissions /pa.ʁɛ.sjɔ̃/ or /pa.ʁe.sjɔ̃/	paraissiez /pa.ʁɛ.sje/ or /pa.ʁe.sje/	paraissent /pa.ʁɛs/
	imperfect2	parusse /pa.ʁys/	parusses /pa.ʁys/	parût /pa.ʁy/	parussions /pa.ʁy.sjɔ̃/	parussiez /pa.ʁy.sje/	parussent /pa.ʁys/
(compound tenses)	past	present subjunctive of avoir or être + past participle
	pluperfect2	imperfect subjunctive of avoir or être + past participle
imperative		–	tu	–	nous	vous	–
simple		—	parais /pa.ʁɛ/	—	paraissons /pa.ʁɛ.sɔ̃/ or /pa.ʁe.sɔ̃/	paraissez /pa.ʁɛ.se/ or /pa.ʁe.se/	—
compound		—	simple imperative of avoir or être + past participle	—	simple imperative of avoir or être + past participle	simple imperative of avoir or être + past participle	—
1 The French gerund is usable only with the preposition en.
2 In less formal writing or speech, these tenses may be found to have been replaced in the following way: past historic → present perfect past anterior → pluperfect imperfect subjunctive → present subjunctive pluperfect subjunctive → past subjunctive (Christopher Kendris [1995], Master the Basics: French, pp. 77, 78, 79, 81).

Related terms

• apparaître
• disparaître

Descendants

• Saint Dominican Creole French: paroître
  • Haitian Creole: parèt

Noun

paraître m (plural paraîtres)

1. appearance

Anagrams

• parerait, piratera, râperait, repaitra, repaîtra, reparait, reparaît, réparait, repatria