You could say “avant de sortir” and that would be normal enough, but I went to say “après de sortir” and realized it sounded wrong, but so did “après sortir.” How should that be said? E.g. “on paie après de sortir.” And why does avant use de but apres does not, when the construction is similar ?
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Avant and Après actually aren't symmetrical, après behaves a little differently.
You can only say "Après [quelque chose*]" or "Après que [sujet + verbe]".
The "quelque chose*" being a nominal group (noun + determinant) or verbal group (at infinitive). So your sentence would be:
On paie après être sortis.
With more complex groups:
On est partis après avoir mangé notre sandwich.
Il est sorti après nous avoir salué.
Using Après que is a little bit trickier, because it must be followed by indicative but the vast majority of people use subjunctive instead (because you should use subjunctive with "Avant que", as the action is not completed so it's still hypothetical).
So you should say:
Il est parti après qu'il a payé.
But you might hear:
Il est parti après qu'il ait payé.
Teleporting Goat
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And you might read the literary Il partit après qu'il eut payé. – jlliagre Apr 30 '18 at 08:18
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Why have you both written sortis with an s at the end? Is the subject on assumed to be plural? I always thought it was singular. – temporary_user_name Apr 30 '18 at 14:09
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@Aerovistae Yup, when on means we, you have to write it with an s (and an e if the subject is feminine). – Teleporting Goat Apr 30 '18 at 14:32
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The 's' at the end of the verb is one of those infamous somewhat obscure conjugation rules in French. Verbs ending in -ir conjugate to plural with the auxiliary verb "être", but not with the auxiliary verb "avoir". "Nous sommes sortis" but "Nous avons sorti le meuble". The same rule applies to gender of the subject. "La liste est sortie", but "L'organisation a sorti la liste." – Drunken Code Monkey Apr 30 '18 at 15:18
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What the seller or the bartender is more likely to say is : "On paye après la sortie." – Evargalo Apr 30 '18 at 15:24
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1Also, "qu'il a payé" is incorrect. The correct conjugation is subjonctive past, which is "qu'il ait payé". Another acceptable (but antiquated, or too formal for most situations) conjugation is "subjonctif plus-que-parfait" "qu'il eût payé". "Subjonctif imparfait" is similar with "qu'il payât". – Drunken Code Monkey Apr 30 '18 at 15:29
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3@DrunkenCodeMonkey You must be part of the "vast majority" I referred to :) Look it up, indicative is the correct mode. – Teleporting Goat Apr 30 '18 at 15:30
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I have never heard it spoken or read it written this way, and I am a native French speaker and writer since birth. I would wager that it would be marked as a mistake in most high schools. "Il a payé" is fine because there is no "que". The moment you add it in it becomes subjonctive. "Après qu'il ait payé" does not imply that he has already paid. – Drunken Code Monkey Apr 30 '18 at 15:34
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Note that "qu'il a payé" is perfectly fine if it is a complement: "Les factures qu'il a payé..." – Drunken Code Monkey Apr 30 '18 at 15:40
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2"Les factures qu'il a payées"* - About subjunctive after "Après que", I'll admit that very few people use indicative (I don't even use it orally, people often think you're wrong), but it's the correct way to say it, so I think I should present it as such. – Teleporting Goat Apr 30 '18 at 15:44
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I`m honestly very curious of your sources. "Les factures qu'il a payé" cannot have -es. The subject is "il", not "les factures". "Il a payé les factures" – Drunken Code Monkey Apr 30 '18 at 15:50
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2@DrunkenCodeMonkey Après qu'il eût payé is as incorrect as après qu'il ait payé. That should be après qu'il eut payé or après qu'il a payé, despite for the latter to hurt that bad French ears... and the past participle never agrees with the subject when avoir is used as an auxiliary. See https://www.projet-voltaire.fr/regles-orthographe/les-fraises-que-j-ai-mange-les-fraises-que-j-ai-mangees/ – jlliagre Apr 30 '18 at 16:13
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@TeleportingGoat In the first example, "sorti" can be written with and without an "s" since we don't what "on" refers to (could be a group of people or could be a generic rule of the restaurant) I think the example should be changed as to avoid confusion – William Perron Apr 30 '18 at 17:02
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So, after looking it up, it appears two or three scholars decided that the subjunctive is wrong, yet I still question the logic. The argument is that past tense necessarily implies the action already happened, thus the indicative is right. Oh well, so be it. What I have a hard time with however is I cannot find any published example using this syntax, yet I can find plenty of written and spoken examples with "qu'il ait". Apparently someone decided upon it one sunny morning in 1998 and so it was from then on. – Drunken Code Monkey Apr 30 '18 at 19:15
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1Concerning the mood in the “après que” subordinate (which is somewhat off-topic here), you'd better read the answers to this question. https://french.stackexchange.com/questions/11/avant-que-et-apr%c3%a8s-que-indicatif-ou-subjonctif – Stéphane Gimenez Oct 29 '18 at 19:14
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Yes, après de sortir is incorrect while avant de sortir is not. The de is almost always mandatory between avant and an infinitive.
Historically, French started by using no preposition between avant and an infinitive, e.g.:
...avant faire...
This still exists is set expressions like avant faire droit, avant manger.
Then que was used :
Faut-il toutefois vaincre avant que triompher, Corneille.
Mais avant que partir, je me ferais justice, Racine.
Then a de was appended:
Avant que de songer à condamer les gens, Molière
and finally, in the 18th century, the que was dropped and the modern form emerged:
...avant de faire...
On the other hand, après doesn't need or accept this de and in your case we would use:
après être sortis
Source: gabrielwyler, Grevisse
