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- Topic: Swedish >
- "She comes at any time."
"She comes at any time."
Translation:Hon kommer när som helst.
45 Comments
It means "whenever".
... som helst is an expression meaning any.... It can be used with question words to form vad som helst, hur som helst, vem som helst and the like. Comparable to adding -ever in English.
364
Thank you. I've been studying Swedish for almost two years and I had never heard that expression before. Much appreciated.
Would this be synonymous with the English phrase "She's coming at any moment"?
Yes, but you could also use vid varje tidpunkt, which translates roughly as "at each point in time" or vid tidpunkt som helst (not certain that the latter is grammatically correct, though).
- 1458
Yes, that is also a good sentence. If you want to, you can add a preposition and say Hon kommer vid vilken tid som helst, but the preposition is optional.
Vilken means which, right ? So Whats is the literal translation for vilken tid som helst ? and vid vilken tid som helst ?
När som helst = at any time // any time ? Vilken som helst = at any time // any time ? Vid vilken tid som helst = at any time // any time ?
What about whichever then ?
- 1081
Hi Duo! Could you please recommend some English article where I could read about conjunctions usage? For example as far as I can see word "som" could have many meanings depending on words near and it not really clear at all. Thanks in advance
I can't understand "när som helst" = "at any time"!!! Can anyone explain this?
som is a broad word, it means much more than "who". Here, it's more like "when-so-ever". Also please refer to Zmrzlina's comment above.
när som helst literally means "when-so-ever". If you replace när with att, it turns into "to-so-ever", and doesn't make a lot of sense.
- 121
Hmmmm.....
"At any time" feels a bit wider than the definition of "när som helst" that I'm used to in Swedish (which usually implies "very soon" or "now in a minute")
We accept quite a few options here, but I honestly think the English and Swedish defaults correspond pretty well here, actually.
It doesn't really translate literally. The best direct translation is "when-so-ever". In isolation:
- när means "when"
- som means "which", "that", or "as"
- helst means "most preferrably"
- 121
It's just an idiom. "At any time" would literary be "vid vilken som helst tid", which sounds weird and extremely awkward in Swedish. English "any" is usually "vad som helst" or "vilken som helst" or "vilket som helst" in Swedish, so that's the reason for "som helst" in this case.
To get rid of the awkwardness we've simply reduced "vid vilken tid" to "när", and thus you get "at any time" -> "vid vilken som helst tid" -> "vid vilken tid som helst" (just reordering the words, still exactly the same meaning) -> "när som helst" (exchanging "vid vilken tid" to "när").
I hope this makes some kind of sense, at least.
- 406
She comes at any time? Is this intended to mean something like "she'll be here any minute now"?
Can someone translate när som helst into a literal English phrase so i can remember. Is it like " when she wants" or "When shes been a while" ??
- 363
I've heard some say that "När som helst" is similar to "Whenever" but others saying it's nearer to "Any time now". What's the common usage? Or perhaps either?
Is it really a big difference to say 'nar som helst' vs 'var som helst.' I always get these two confused because I think if 'nar' as when .. so 'nar som helst' as whenever she wants
- när = when
- var = where
Hence:
- när som helst = whenever / at any time
- var som helst = wherever / at any place
So the difference is pretty large. :)
I think you may be misremembering. Did you have a specific sentence in mind?
If you mean what does each individual word in the phrase mean, you can over over and it will give you for that word and then also for the phrase as a whole.
If you mean what does it mean translated, that's answered above.
