"Chcę być bliżej ciebie."

Translation: I want to be closer to you.

[RedstonekPL]

( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

[mark.boats]

Couple of questions... "ciebie" is genitive case in this sentence right?

Second, does the Polish phrase mirror the English in that "to be closer to someone" can mean both physically located closer to them, but is more often used to indicate an emotional closeness or relationship?

[Vengir]

Yes to both

[mark.boats]

Dziękuję :)

[va-diim]

I am confused about this construction. The Russian word-for-word translation,

Ja chociu byť bliże tiebia,

with the corresponding declension into the genitive case, means "I want to be closer than you," Because of the comparative adverb bliżej, or "closer"/"more close", and the genitive or accusative ciebie.

In Russian we would say

Ja chociu byt' bliże k tiebie, meaning "I want to be closer to you."

tiebie(dative) = tobie in Polish "to you", and I don't know how the Russian preposition k translates into Polish if at all.

[Vengir]

Russian "k" in Polish would probably be "do". Although sometimes you may see more poetic "ku". You must remember though that "do" and "ku" take different cases. But in this sentence you can use neither of them.

"Closer than you" is „Bliżej niż ty” or „Bliżej od ciebie”.

[va-diim]

This makes sense in Russian too.

Bliże ciem ty = closer than you

Bliże ot tiebia = closer from you

So what would bliżej tobie mean?

[Vengir]

That's sounds just weird, but maybe in some situation it could mean "closer for you". "bliżej dla ciebie" might be a better option.

[va-diim]

Yeah same in Russian. bliże tiebie or bliże dla tiebia "closer for you." It seems the k is necessary for it to make sense. OK never mind then. I guess it's just one of those things that doesn't translate analogously between Polish and Russian. Thanks

[CelioFM]

Couldn´t it be: "I want to be nearer to you" ?
Google Translator aproves this sentence like a synonymous of "I want to be closer to you"... and, if we use the translation between English and Esperanto, gives us the same polish translation: "Chcę być bliżej ciebie"..., even if we explore the translation back and forth. "Mi deziras esti pli proksima al vi".

[Jellei]

Well, apparently it is correct. Added, then.

But really, Google Translate may be getting better and better, but it still is more of a help in understanding the general idea, than a really trustworthy source of knowledge.

[LizErett]

why is it bliżej not bliziej? I thought in general if there was a vowel after ż it became zi. Maybe it is a rule I made up.

[alik1989]

/Ż/ can't be followed by /i/, but all other vowels are fine.

[Vengir]

The rule you are talking about applies to the letter Ź, not Ż.

[LizErett]

Thanks Alik and Vengir, I was getting the two rules muddled I think. Thanks for sorting it out