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- Topic: Russian >
- "Я читаю сам."
43 Comments
414
I know the meaning is supposed to be "I read by myself" but I forgot to type "by" and ended up submitting "I read myself" and surprised that it is considered correct.
Is "I read myself" correct in English to imply the same meaning with "I read by myself"?
534
"I read myself" does not, in English, equate with "I read by myself". You would use this construction to indicate that you read, too (eg. in response to someone saying that they read a lot of thrillers, you might say "I read a lot myself but I prefer romances.").
419
Because that would require commas to be correct and Duo ignores punctuation thereby rendering the word order incorrect. It's a struggle, I concur.
the suggested translations were both 'by myself' and 'on my own'. And in English that has two different meanings
"I read by myself" means "I read and no one else is around"
"I read on my own" can either mean that or the meaning I've associated more commonly with that: "I read and no one else is helping me"
which version is 'я читаю сам'?
14
In the English translation, "myself" is treated as an adverb in this context (ie, it describes how you read, not what you read). It's not that you are reading your own person, but you personally are reading on your own.
I looked up "сам" on wiktionary but got no result. There's a page for "себя́" with a big declension table, but no mention of "сам"... Why is that?
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/%D1%81%D0%B5%D0%B1%D1%8F#Declension