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- "I am writing the book of the…
"I am writing the book of the century."
Translation:Jag skriver århundradets bok.
40 Comments
673
I don't think your examples in English encompass my original question well.
For example: 1)I am writing the book --> 1a)Jag skriver boken (easy)
2)I'm writing THE book of THE century
Is equivalent to
3)I'm writing THE century's book So we could have in Swedish:
2a)Jag skriver boken av århundradet ( if I was translating the first example literally)
Or
3a)Jag skriver århundradets bok ( for the second example in English)
Now, is the translation 2a) valid and palatable in Swedish?
You're replying to a comment that is over four years old... :)
But as for 2a, no, that's not grammatical. Swedish doesn't have the "of" construction for possessives. Hence, århundradets bok corresponds equally well to "the century's book" and "the book of the century", and idiomatics will dictate which one is the better translation into English.
So in this sentence "the book" is clearly definite, the only reason why we don't translate as "boken" is because its after a possessor.
The alternative "Jag skriver boken av århundradet" doesn't work because the preposition "av" should not be used in such a context (as explained by Arnauti a couple of comments below).
Could someone tell if i got this right?
1453
You just can't say that. We don't use av nearly as much as you use of in English. Just like you say a cup of coffee and we say en kopp kaffe.
1453
It's en kopp te. If you say "en kopp av te", you'd be speaking about a cup made out of tea :)
1453
If you mean årtiondets bok, that would be the book of the decade. I agree that would be enough of an achievement to be proud of :)
If you mean genitive + noun in the definitive form, we don't do that. When something is 'owned' by another noun in the genitive, it cannot be definite. It's the same in English really, you don't say the woman's the house or even my the house.
366
The common expression in English would be "the book of the century" but the equivalent in Swedish translates literally as: "THE century's book" so book (bok) does not take the definite article. It"s just like the words "Doras bok" - the word book would not take the definite article because that would read "Doras the book". Hope you get what I mean.