"Sofia hopes that Adamo will come back soon."
Translation:Sofia esperas, ke Adamo baldaŭ revenos.
20 Comments
The adventures of Sofia and Adamo are my favourite thing about Duo Esperanto
76
Technically, Esperanto has got no subjunctive, but a conditional form. PMEG calls it "imaga modo" (imagine mode). Do not apply Spanish grammar rules to Esperanto.
thanks! but are you saying that "revenus" is technically incorrect in this case?
- 76
Yes, I am. "Revenus" translates as "would come back" or "might come back". The original English sentence gives us no hint to use a conditional form here.
What about "revenu"? According to this https://adventuresinesperanto.wordpress.com/tag/subjunctive/ and this https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jussive_mood#Esperanto the Jussive mode (ending with "u") is used as the subjunctive (although it isn't used with esperi, like in French)
@jxetkubo
How do you mean “English has no subjunctive”? It most certainly does. (I suggest that you Google it (← that's a subjunctive right there…).)
- 1488
Were it not true that English had no subjunctive, I might agree with you.
- 76
If you reed the Wikipedia article carefully, you will find that Esperanto has a volitive (-u), but not a subjunctive. For some cases that this u-form is used for in Esperanto some other languages use the subjunctive. This is no help here because this an English-Esperanto course and the examples cannot be transferred to English because English has no subjunctive. In fact, it does not change the mood of the subclause, but of the mainclause. I can not see how it would be useful to explain something quite simple with a reference to a complex mood system of third language which also works differently. But also in French « espérer que … » is not used with subjuncitf, but with indicatif. :-)
- 35
I think the subjunctive would be correct (you're describing an imagined state of being, after all) but using the future tense seems more natural to me.
Thanks! I am confused, because in Spanish, for instance, I think most people would use the subjunctive in this case
I'm also confused about this sentence. According to what we learned in the lesson about the Imperative, I thought that the correct translation should be:
Sofia esperas ke Adamo baldaux revenu
"Revenu" takes the imperative because Adamo's return is not just her desire or preference, but also joined with "ke." Cxu ne?
Isn't "baldaux" functioning as an adverb here? Shouldn't it have an -e ending? Or is this an exception to Esperanto grammar?
You are right that baldaŭ functions as an adverb here. But baldaŭ itself already is an adverb, so there is no need to add an -e ending. See aŭ ending in Wiktionary.
Tuj is more ‘right away’, ‘immediately’ or ‘in a second/minute’, whereas baldaŭ is just ‘soon’. So tuj is sooner than baldaŭ.
