"When was this book written?"

Topic: Polish

"When was this book written?"

Translation:Kiedy została napisana ta książka?

March 31, 2016

6 Comments

LICA98

can you say "była napisana"?

March 31, 2016

Emwue

Yes. IMHO, it should even be accepted here, so please report it, if it isn't.

March 31, 2016

LICA98

so these type of sentences can use either został or był?

April 1, 2016

Emwue

Yes, I can't think of any exception, though using "był/a" instead of "został/a" feels a bit more colloquial to me.

April 1, 2016

johnfry7

I left out the "została", but the correct answer was given as "Kiedy napisano tę książkę?" Is that an acceptable alternative?

December 27, 2017

Jellei

Mod

It's quite different grammatically, but perfectly correct.

Generally, you can't leave out "została", because then you arrive at "Kiedy ta książka napisana" which would be like "When this book written".

"Kiedy napisano tę książkę" uses a completely impersonal form, so there is no real subject, but it's quite a common construction. It just works like "When X happened"... only that X is not the subject.

December 28, 2017