- Forum >
- Topic: Swedish >
- "She does not even have shoes…
"She does not even have shoes on."
Translation:Hon har inte ens skor på sig.
23 Comments
128
Ens was listed in one of the lesson covers a ways back, but never used. In every lesson, each word listed should be used at least once.
If I could get a little help with this it would be great! I tried to construct this sentence like so:
She is wearing her shoes -> Hon har på sig hennes skor She is not wearing her shoes -> Hon har på sig inte hennes skor She is not even wearing her shoes -> Hon har på sig inte ens hennes skor
This is not the first time that the construction of this type of sentence has tripped me up. From the answer I can see that I am wrong, but I am struggling to come up with a way of building sentences with adverbs :/. If there is a video or something I could read which explains that would also be helpful
Thanks very much
1477
Just a short answer, I hope someone else will suggest some further reading, but inte needs to go after the verb, and it comes between the verb and its particle:
Hon har på sig sina skor.
Hon har inte på sig sina skor.
Hon har inte ens på sig skorna.
I believa "hennes" would refer to some other female person's shoes, which would feel odd here. When referring to someone's own possessions or qualities, the reflexive sin/a is used (just as it's "på sig" instead of, I think, "på henne").
English doesn't have a reflexive pronoun as a standalone - " own" qualifies it in a possessive, as in "her own shoes", while "-self" does so in pronouns, "on herself". Sometimes it's left implied, though, as " her (own) shoes" would often be unless you specifically wanted to emphasize that they were HER shoes, not somebody else's. In Swedish, though, the distinction between reflexive and not has got me marked wrong a number of times for using the wrong pronoun. (By that token, do not take what I say here as expert advice!)
1239
That was the word order I used, too.
If you can say either Hon har skor på sig or Hon har på sig skor to render the positive, then it seems reasonable to expect either Hon har inte ens skor på sig or Hon har på sig inte ens skor to work in the negative; even if you don't know German (or Dutch).
But that's language for you: not terribly logical.
543
So how exactly is this sentence constructed? Does the “inte” go with “har” as in “har inte på sig” or with ens as in “inte ens?” As a direct translation, would it be “she has [not even] shoes on her” or “she does not have even shoes on her?”