german question

[pechvogel]

Hi, all,

 

I have a question about this sentence: "Beatrix und Jakob wollten nach der Schule in die Stadt fahren,   (9)   ihrem Klassenlehrer ein tolles Gechenk zu kaufen."  Why is the preposition 'zu' in this sentence - i.e., what's its syntax?

 

Thanks, 

pechvogel

[pechvogel]

Unterwegs aber machten sie an einer Eisdiele Halt und entlang viel zu viel Geld fürs Eis aus.

 

Why is there a need for two 'zu' prepositions?  And why is the 'aus' at the end?  (For the latter I assume zeugma?)

[Nuya]

I am a German native, however, I dont know much about explaining grammar.

I will give it a try though.

I guess you already know how to translate the sentence?

"Beatrix and Jakob wanted to go into the city after school to buy their teacher a great present" (or something like that)

"Beatrix und Jakob wollten nach der Schule in die Stadt fahren, um ihrem Klassenlehrer ein tolles Geschenk zu kaufen."

The grammatical contruct is called "finale Satzverbindung". This means the subordinate clause describes the goal of the action described in the main clause.

This is achieved through prepositions like "damit", "um zu" "zu".

Another example of a sentence like that would be:

"Ich lerne jeden Tag, um die Abschlussprüfung zu bestehen"

but also:

"Ich lerne jeden Tag, damit ich die Abschlussprüfung bestehe."

You can also switch subordinate clause and main clause around so you would get something like:

"Damit ich die Abschlussprüfung bestehe, lerne ich jeden Tag."

or:

"Um die Abschlussprüfung zu bestehen, lerne ich jeden Tag."

 

As you can see "Finalsätze" answer to the question "warum?, wieso?, wozu?, weshalb?, weswegen?".

 

If you dont want a "finale Satzverbindung", you can also choose the preposition Zu in combination with a "Dativ".

That would change the above sentence to:

"Zum Bestehen der Abschlussprüfung lerne ich jeden Tag."

This would rid your sentence of the comma.

 

Hope this helps at all...

[Nuya]

As to the second sentence you just posted:

Where did you get the idea that "entlang" is the word that needs to fill the gap?

 

I would have filled the gap using "gaben".

Plus I dont see the second "zu" in the sentence?

 

The "aus" at the end of the sentence belongs to the "gaben" i just filled the gap with.

 

The sentence should be:

"Unterwegs aber machten sie an einer Eisdiele Halt und gaben viel zu viel Geld fürs Eis aus."

 

The complete word is "ausgeben" = in this case: "spend money". But you basically have to cut it in half and put each part in the right place of the sentence and of course you change it to the correct tense.

 

so you get

Unterwegs aber machten sie an einer Eisdiele Halt und GABEN viel zu viel Geld fürs Eis AUS.

 

Those two "words" are part of the same word. (A real Zeugma is usually rhetoric and ironic, but it sort of uses these linguistic elements as well)

 

(trying to explain this to a non-native speaker, i just realized, German is a weird language^^)

Edited June 9, 2013 by Nuya