"Zaraz będę czytała książkę."
Translation:Soon I will be reading a book.
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right away for zaraz? Soon does not do it for me and my mother used the word many times "at me" and the meaning was always NOW and not soon (or else I would be in hot water!)
Well, "zaraz" is difficult. It's not exactly 'right now', but 'almost now' :D 'in a moment' still seems the best to me. For example if my mother asks me to wash the dishes and I'll say "zaraz!" to her, I will come to the kitchen 5 minutes later. So it's open to 'interpretations' as well.
Anyway, the continuous 'will be reading a book' sounds strange to me with 'right away'...
We have something very similar to this in Latino Spanish with "ahora/ahorita" :)
I think that “Immediately” or “Shortly/Briefly” could work as well, regarding your example; the former would be a mere translation “Gleich!”, which I use very often in similar situations, while the latter could perhaps be equivocal in this context, and maybe entirely wrong; in the latter case, I would have failed the language through misunderstanding. But if all of these should not work, I think that this is one of those words exclusively comprehensible for native speakers and untranslatable for others. Comparable to the Norwegian “hyggelig” or the Japanese “umami”. :D
Is 'shortly' correct in that translation? It doesn't seem good for me, idkr...
In this position in the word order (we only accept it at the end) it's correct.
No, it would be "Zaraz przeczytam książkę". "Przeczytać" is a perfective verb, whereas "czytać" is imperfective.
"Zaraz będę czytała książkę" means "Soon I will be reading a book".
Thanks! Grammar is basically not taught at all in most American schools, merely corrected - so I wasn't sure what "perfective" and "imperfective" were until now. :/
In English there is no such concept like aspect but it is present in Polish. What helps to distinguish perfective from imperfective in English are tenses.
Imperfective verbs don't have in Polish separate future form but the future tense is compound of future form of the verb "być" + past form of the imperfective verb or infitive. Look at the table of conjugation: https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/czyta%C4%87
It's something between "now" and "soon"... I think the closest translation is "in a moment".
How would you say, "Soon I will read a book"? All the examples have been in future progressive and not simple future tense. (except 'have', I guess)
Future Compound is built as follows: the appropriate future form of "być" + either an infinitive, or a gendered 3rd person past form. True, on its own "czytała" means "she was reading". But "będę czytała" means "I will be reading", said by a woman.
So you have "będę czytał" (I, a man, will be reading) / "będę czytała" (I, a woman, will be reading) and "będę czytać" (I will be reading, no gender mentioned).
Then there's "będziesz czytał/czytała/czytać" (you will be reading, dependent on the gender of 'you'), and then "będzie czytał" (he will be reading), "będzie czytała" (she will be reading), "będzie czytać" (he/she will be reading).
It's probably easier for a learner to always use the infinitive version, but the gendered one is also very common, so you need to understand how it's used.
I must've made a typo, going to read was accepted at the end. (Going to be reading wasn't.)
Every word order which accepts "going to read" accepts "going to be reading" as well.
"zaraz" may not be easy to translate, but I don't think "now" works for it. "now" is "teraz".