voici

Literally, “look here”. From vois (“see!, look!”), second-person singular imperative of voir (“to see, to look”) and ci (“here”).

• IPA^(key): /vwa.si/

• Audio:

  (file)

voici (defective)

1. here (it) is

   Voici le fromage.

   Here's the cheese.

   1. (with an infinitive, almost exclusively with venir, otherwise dated) introduces something or someone through its action

      Voici venir son oncle! ― Here comes her uncle!

      • 1873, Charles Cros, Le Coffret de santal:

        Voici grouiller déjà les gens des halles.

        (please add an English translation of this quotation)

2. expresses something in the making or that is happening; used with pronouns, can serve as a loose copula

   Nous voici tous ensemble. ― We are now all together

   Voici arrivée la fin du printemps, mais ne le pleurons donc pas. ― Spring's end is nigh, but come, let us not grieve.

3. (in opposition to voilà (both not necessarily in the same sentence together)) this is, introduces something one is about to say, whereas voilà something said

   Voilà ce que je lui ai demandé, et voici sa réponse : « ... » ― That's what I asked her and this is her answer: "..."

   Voici la preuve de ce que je viens de vous dire. ― This is the proof of what I have been talking to you about.

• Voici is a defective verb; its only conjugation is in the present indicative tense, even though it can appear in phrases that imply another tense.
• It can take direct object pronouns:

  Tu m'as appelé, me voici! ― You called me, and here I am!

• Indirect object pronouns:

  Lui voici une avance phénoménale! ― He has now (literally: “There is to him/for him […] ”) a tremendous upperhand!

• As well as partitive and locative pronouns (en and y)

  J'ai fait des efforts et en voici maintenant la preuve. ― I have done my best and this is now to prove it.

  M'y voici enfin ! l'Amérique. ― At last I'm here! America.

• It can also occur in relative clauses:

  l'homme que voici ― the man who is here/this man (right) here

• It is used to designate a person or object near the speaker, in contrast to voilà which is mainly used to introduce a slightly distant person or object.
• In face-to-face conversations where both participants can see the subject of the conversation, voici is often replaced by voilà.
• When voici and voilà are interchangeable, the former can be taken as of a higher register than the latter; voici is also altogether rarer in day-to-day conversation:
  • Voici la porte is a polite way to tell someone where the exit is whereas,
  • Voilà la porte could in some cases be considered rude and roughly translated as an invitation to leave.

voici

1. ago

   Synonyms: il y a, voilà

   Il est parti voici trois jours. ― He left three days ago.

• voilà

• “voici”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.