- Forum >
- Topic: Russian >
- "Волшебник никогда не опаздыв…
46 Comments
Волшебник никогда не опаздывает, Фродо Бэггинс. Как и не приходит рано. Он приходит именно тогда, когда нужно.
"...когда сочтёт нужным" ≠ "...when he means to [arrive]"
"When he means to..." вообще звучит как-то не так.
"...когда сочтёт нужным" ≈ "...when he/she feels like it." (фиксированный оборот).
"When he means to..." вообще звучит как-то не так.
Это же цитата. Из Толкина: "A wizard is never late, nor is he early. He arrives precisely when he means to."
Mea culpa, не распознал.
В любом случае, "when he means to" означает "когда (и) намеревался", а не "когда сочтёт нужным". Как мне кажется, "когда сочтёт нужным" имеет явный оттенок волюнтаризма ("когда взблагорассудится"), а не заранее разработанного плана. По-английски это именно "...when he/she feels like it" или, чуть более формально, "when he/she pleases".
"работа (чья?) команды", though I know where you got that from :) "good work russian team" → "молодцы, русская команда!" is a better way to say it. (the comma makes it an addressed phrase, while no comma makes it a willing disregard of word order to stress the "молодцы", so choose what you want it to be like)
Am I the only one who didn't get the LOTR reference at first and thought it was just a weird sentence?
I used the word "volshebnik" in the presence of a native Russian speaker and they were surprised I knew the word. But they seemed surprised in a happy way.
I disagree. "Never is" is a very awkward word order unless it is used at the beginning of a sentence: "Never is a wizard late!" That would hardly be a neutral word order, but still acceptable. Yours - not so much (IMHO).
P.S. If you need a "second opinion", do a search on "never" here
Specifically, in the middle of a sentence "never" should be placed
after BE verb
after auxiliary verbs
before other verbs
Tell that to the translators who did this: First Corinthians 13 gives us a very clear picture: Love endures long and is patient and kind; love never is envious nor boils over with jealousy, ..." I would think in this context (a chapter on somewhat lightly archaic constructions and words of historical relevance), this order would be permissible. Also, even a cursory look will tell you that 'never is' IS NOT a very uncommon word order in English - sure, it's less common than 'is never' - but this course is not about getting your English 100% in line with some weird ideal prescriptivist idea of what English should be that not even authors adhere to (just look for 'never is' in google books!) but to teach us RUSSIAN.
Here's a source: The Cambridge Grammar of the English Language (Pullum, Huddleston, 2002):
Position of adverbs Auxiliaries differ from lexical verbs in their position relative to various adverbs, notably frequency adverbs (such as always, usually, often, sometimes, never) and modal adverbs (such as possibly, probably, certainly). Such adverbs tend to precede lexical verbs but to follow auxiliaries: [35] LEXICAL VERB AUXILIARY VERB i a. He always looks miserable. b. He is always miserable. ii a. They probably go by bus. b. They have probably gone by bus. With lexical verbs the opposite ordering (with the adverb following the verb and preceding its complement) is excluded: He looks always miserable; They go probably by bus.13 With auxiliaries the verb + adverb order shown above is the usual one, *but the reverse order of adverb + verb is also possible*: compare He always is miserable; They probably have gone by bus. One special case where the latter order might be found is with emphatic polarity, with stress on the auxiliary.
(sorry for the layout being a bit scrambled, and the asterixes marking for malformed clauses have been lost, but ... just look up the source yourself if you don't believe me)
So there. Cambridge Grammar of the English language beats your random website on the internet.
So there. Cambridge Grammar of the English language beats your random website on the internet.
It dosen't really. Firstly, the specific use depends on an adverb (even from the same group). The examples of the non-standard ordering given in The Cambridge Grammar use "always". To my ear they sound infinitely better than they would with "never". Moreover, they are specifically marked as not neutral - they are used to emphasise something. Duo doesn't ususally accept emphatic word orders in Russian (and for a good reason), so why should it treat English differently?
Secondly, and most importantly, all alternative translations are added to the database by hand. If you insist on some non-standard use (for absolutely no reason), you are taking your chances. Just don't complain that your "creative" answer is not in the database.
Moreover, I would personally baulk at adding it: many Duolingo users also take reverse courses in order to practice the base rather than the target language. Accepting questionable constructions is a disservice to them.
As soon as I saw this notification, I thought "I bet that's to say I should've used a мягкий знак!" LOL I was trying to decide last night and was just toooo tired to go look it up.
I am always baffled by when to use э vs а in transliterations... I'll attempt to remember this one in future 8-o ;)
You never know :D You can just pretend you've read a different translation of LoTR, there are tons already...
