My Irish is conversational. I also know some fluent (native and near-native) speakers I could ask for help.
I'd say just ask here. I know we have members who would be interested in learning a bit more about Irish. (After you reply, I'll move the thread to the Languages forum.)
So for a story I'm working on, one of the characters will be making a keen. It's raw emotion, baring of the soul; but I would really want my character to sound like she's Irish, and not a Googlebot!
If ar neamhní (lit. "on nothing") is an idiom, I'm not familiar with it. The usual way of saying "for nothing" in either the sense of "for free" or "in vain" is in aisce. If you're worried about the ambiguity, you could also say gan chúis "without cause".
LOL. Is breá liom literally means "is fine with me"; I've never heard it used for romantic or platonic love, only when talking about objects or experiences. And go dtí deireadh an ama is completely unidiomatic.elemtilas wrote:I love you until the end of time.
Is breá liom tú go dtí deireadh an ama
elemtilas wrote:Beidh mé ag cuimhneamh ar do gháire
In both these cases, wouldn't you say the tense is actually (recent) past rather than present? That is "is taken" is really a slightly archaic way of saying "has been taken", in which case I'd prefer a verbal noun construction for both.elemtilas wrote:My boy is taken from me
Tógtar mo bhuachaill uaim
my heart is ripped from my breast
tá mo chroí sracadh as mo chíche
If you want to make it more literary, some changes you could make are:elemtilas wrote:I'd be looking for better word choices, older, deeper, more meaningful, non-slangy word choices. Like if "ciche" usually means chicken breast, then I'd want something different!
I'd prefer to project the notion of timelessness, as if all notions of past and future were compressed into the eternal now. If that can be done in Gaelic without a gob smackingly long and convoluted construction, then great! Otherwise, I'd prefer the simplest way of expressing the future.LOL. Is breá liom literally means "is fine with me"; I've never heard it used for romantic or platonic love, only when talking about objects or experiences. And go dtí deireadh an ama is completely unidiomatic.elemtilas wrote:I love you until the end of time.
Is breá liom tú go dtí deireadh an ama
For "I love you", I say tá grá agam ort; some people say tá grá agam duit. Is there a reason why this is simple present rather than future?
Oo, nice choices!For "until the end of time", Irish has the literal equivalent go hearr aimsire and several fitting idioms, including:
i gcaitheamh an domhain "while the world lasts"
go lá dheireadh an domhain "until the last day of the world"
go deo na deor "while there are still tears"
fad is a bheas grian ag dul deiseal "as long as the sun will follow its course"
The time is indeed recent past, but again I'd prefer to disentangle from notions of past or future time as much as possible.elemtilas wrote:Beidh mé ag cuimhneamh ar do gháireIn both these cases, wouldn't you say the tense is actually (recent) past rather than present? That is "is taken" is really a slightly archaic way of saying "has been taken", in which case I'd prefer a verbal noun construction for both.elemtilas wrote:My boy is taken from me
Tógtar mo bhuachaill uaim
my heart is ripped from my breast
tá mo chroí sracadh as mo chíche
I don't want literary per se. This character should sound like she's come from the Gaeltacht in the late 19th to first quarter of the 20th century, not 2022!Tá mo bhuachaill tógtha uaim.
Tá an croí tarraingthe as an mbrollach orm.
(You could also say as mo bhrollach, of course, but I think this sounds better with an adversative dative.)
If you want to make it more literary, some changes you could make are:elemtilas wrote:I'd be looking for better word choices, older, deeper, more meaningful, non-slangy word choices. Like if "ciche" usually means chicken breast, then I'd want something different!
But if the synthetic forms are a little more elevated, or a little less urban then that's much the better!Would they still have been in wider use a hundred to 125 or so years ago do you think?1. Synthetic forms instead of analytic:
ní dhéanfaidh mé > ní dhéanfad
beidh mé > bead
2. Dative plurals:
ar do shúile > ar do shúilibh
ar do lámha > ar do lámhaibh
Synthetic forms are still used dialectally, chiefly in Munster. Dative plurals are also still found in Munster, but only really in fossilised forms.
Since Irish has an inflected future, it's generally stricter than English about not defaulting to present/non-past forms when speaking of future time. One way around that is the copula (which has only past and non-past forms), but unfortunately there's no copular construction for "love".elemtilas wrote: ↑Mon Feb 28, 2022 9:04 pmI'd prefer to project the notion of timelessness, as if all notions of past and future were compressed into the eternal now. If that can be done in Gaelic without a gob smackingly long and convoluted construction, then great! Otherwise, I'd prefer the simplest way of expressing the future.Is there a reason why this is simple present rather than future?
Unfortunately there's no aorist in Irish so this isn't really possible. I still think the perfect construction works better than the present impersonal (tógtar), which is what GT gave you. To me that a very strong punctual sense.elemtilas wrote:The time is indeed recent past, but again I'd prefer to disentangle from notions of past or future time as much as possible.
Ah, but which Gaeltacht! Because the dialectal variation is significant. Synthetic forms get more common as you move from north to south. The older literary language was primarily based on Munster (the southernmost dialect region), so synthetic forms sound both more literary and more southern. In my corrections, I tried to aim for a neutral koine rather than going full-on Munster (which is what I normally do when I write) since I didn't know exactly what you wanted. Ulster forms are very different (to the point that I find most Ulster Irish difficult to understand).elemtilas wrote:I don't want literary per se. This character should sound like she's come from the Gaeltacht in the late 19th to first quarter of the 20th century, not 2022!
Datives? I think they were already rather literary by then. I couldn't find a single 20th-century attestation of lámhaibh in the Historical Irish Corpus but there are several for s(h)úilibh. Synthetic forms were in wider use in Munster a century ago and that's probably true for some of Connacht as well but I doubt that was the case in Ulster.elemtilas wrote:Would they still have been in wider use a hundred to 125 or so years ago do you think?Synthetic forms are still used dialectally, chiefly in Munster. Dative plurals are also still found in Munster, but only really in fossilised forms.
I see! I shall go back to the future, then.Linguoboy wrote: ↑Tue Mar 01, 2022 12:25 pm Since Irish has an inflected future, it's generally stricter than English about not defaulting to present/non-past forms when speaking of future time. One way around that is the copula (which has only past and non-past forms), but unfortunately there's no copular construction for "love".
I like sound of beidh me better.The various expressions I gave you for "until the end of time" sound better to me with beidh than tá but IANANS so maybe tá is just fine and dandy here.
Understood! I really like the impersonal forms myself. Ba bés linnai, it was a custom with us, kind of thing. Is there an impersonal construction for sracadh ? I like the potential repetition of tógtar ... Xtar. Maybe a verb of similar semantics, like ciorraithe maybe?Unfortunately there's no aorist in Irish so this isn't really possible. I still think the perfect construction works better than the present impersonal (tógtar), which is what GT gave you. To me that a very strong punctual sense.
Ah, but which Gaeltacht!elemtilas wrote:I don't want literary per se. This character should sound like she's come from the Gaeltacht in the late 19th to first quarter of the 20th century, not 2022!
Being in the middle, hopefully Connacht Irish won't be too difficult!Because the dialectal variation is significant. Synthetic forms get more common as you move from north to south. The older literary language was primarily based on Munster (the southernmost dialect region), so synthetic forms sound both more literary and more southern. In my corrections, I tried to aim for a neutral koine rather than going full-on Munster (which is what I normally do when I write) since I didn't know exactly what you wanted. Ulster forms are very different (to the point that I find most Ulster Irish difficult to understand).
Sorry! I meant the synthetic forms.Datives?elemtilas wrote:Would they still have been in wider use a hundred to 125 or so years ago do you think?Synthetic forms are still used dialectally, chiefly in Munster. Dative plurals are also still found in Munster, but only really in fossilised forms.
Um. Also, can you remind me what is meant by "analytic form" vs "synthetic form" in Gaelic? Like, which one is which here?: beidh mé > bead from your earlier example.(Datives) I think they were already rather literary by then. I couldn't find a single 20th-century attestation of lámhaibh in the Historical Irish Corpus but there are several for s(h)úilibh. Synthetic forms were in wider use in Munster a century ago and that's probably true for some of Connacht as well but I doubt that was the case in Ulster.