Thanks to Butt Roidholds for the corrections
Tenho amigos canadianos e americanos do noroeste que se queixam por causa do calor neste verão. Às vezes a temperatura atinge níveis acima de 45 graus. Só pensar naquela temperatura põe-me a cabeça a roda. Entretanto em Inglaterra tem estado frio com céu nublado e muito chuva nas últimas duas semanas. Em Julho.
Olhai, Deus, imploro-vos, mandai os vossos anjos mexer esta caldeirada para igualar os tempos dos vários países!
*groan*
So ages ago, I heard Jose Jorge Letria (a poet who wrote, among other things,”Era Uma Vez Um Cravo”) read a poem called O Dia Mundial da Poesia. I mean, I thought it was called that. I thought he’d written it for world poetry day and he’d called it that because it was about poetry itself, where it comes from and how it’s made. And I spent ages looking for a printed copy because I liked it so much even though my listening skills were terrible and I could only make out about one line in five.
The poem is born of an impulse [… Blah blah blah… ] from the sonorous temptation of a metaphor [… Something something…] Afterwards, it’s writing, the work of hands on the incandescent material of syllables [… Tum ti tum…] The poem is born, finally, from the illusion that there is something left that hasn’t been said [… Etc… ]
I couldn’t catch it all. But I got enough to know I wanted more but I couldn’t find it anywhere online or in any of his books.
Anyway, as you’ve probably gathered by now, it’s not called O Dia Mundial da Poesia at all; it’s called O Verso Alcançando o Infinito. So that explains why I couldn’t find it. Anyway, now I know what to plug into Google, I’ve found another recording of it here…
And if you need the lyrics (I wish I’d had access to then five years ago!) they’re here. Well, some of them are. Another one for my project to learn poetry, I think!
Today’s exercise was to write about a literary character so I chose Billy Pilgrim from Slaughterhouse 5 which is one of my favourite books. I seem to have got a bit distracted and ended up talking about the book itself and it’s various controversies though. Why am I like this? Thanks to ThisCatIsConfused for taking time to correct such a long, rambling text. Only 3 mistakes apparently. Woo-hoo!
Billy Pilgrim é o protagonista dum livro chamado Matadouro Cinco de Kurt Vonnegut. O livro é um dos meus favoritos apesar de ter alguns hum… defeitos…
Após o primeiro capítulo, que serve como introdução, a história própriamente dita* comece com a seguinte frase:
Olha: Billy Pilgrim ficou descolado no tempo**
A vida de Billy não se desenrola linearmente assim como as nossas. A sequência fica interrompida por cortes na linha de tempo. Num momento está sentado numa cadeira em casa; no próximo, encontra-se no planeta Tralfamadore e, logo depois em Dresden em 1945 ao ver a devastação na qual 25,000 seres humanos perderam a vida.
O livro é uma mistura incrível de ficção científica e filosofia e factos verídicos. É engraçado mas é importante tambem. Sobretudo, é muito polémico. Havia muitas tentativas de proibi-lo de várias bibliotecas americanas por causa da “obscenidade” dos conteúdos.
Mas há um problema mesmo muito pior. Já mencionei a figura de 25,000 mortos. É muito, não é? Mas o autor citou um número ainda mais alto: 135,000. Donde vem tal número? Vem dum livro de David Irving que é bem conhecido por minimizar o holocausto. É isso, o maior defeito do livro: O Vonnegut repetiu este número (e outros “factos” dados por Irving) sem intenção prejudicial, mas é irónico que um livro contra a guerra tornou-se um conduto poderoso de propaganda nazista. Há muitas pessoas que acreditam por resultado.
*=this is one of those expressions that I recognise when I see it but I never think to use in my own speech and writing. I’m trying to say “the story itself” (as opposed to the introduction) so I used própria but this is better. Propriamente dito/a.
**=isto a tradição minha da frase “Listen: Billy Pilgrim has come unstuck in time”. Acabo de ver a tradução profissional da Rosa Amorim que diz “Escutem: Billy Pilgrim tornou-se volúvel no tempo”.
Escutem é mais literal do que olha, claro. Mas acho que volúvel é menos literal… Pois. Estou a encolher os ombros… Espero que seja mais-ou-menos compreensível apesar disso…?
Today’s text is back in the garden. Thanks to ThisCatIsConfused for the help with this one. Notes at the bottom.
Estou a pensar em comprar algo para acabar com as lesmas da minha horta porque andam a comer tudo. O tempo aqui em Londres permanece húmido, abafado* e nublado. Perfeito para os moluscos. E assim falecem as abóbaras e os feijões todos.
Mas existem produtos químicos nalgumas pelotas de lesma que podem prejudicar a saúde de outros animais no quintal, tal como ouriços e sapos. Portanto hoje de manhã passei uma meia hora a pesquisar outros métodos de controlar caracóis e lesmas sem assassinar os meus amigos de quatro patas.
Produtos baseados em Sulfato de Alumínio (tal como Fertosan) parecem eficientes** e existem um tipo de fita cola que provavelmente protegeria a estufa. Os outros métodos não me convenceram. Dúvido que um rasto de cascas de ovos moídas teria êxito***.
*=I originally wrote “morno” instead of abafado but morno is mainly used for food, not weather
**= I wrote efetivo which does exist and is in the right ballpark but the boundary between the meanings of effective and efficient is slightly different in Portuguese.
***=Seems better than my original wording “daria em êxito”
I’ve seen occasional grammar guides arguing that it’s technically incorrect to use “ter que” to indicate obligation. For example in “101 Erros de Português que Acabam com a Sua Credibilidade” by Elsa Fernandes, she says “Ultimamente tem-se vulgarizado o uso da construção *ter que* para significar obrigação […] os especialistas indicam que, nesse caso, a forma mais correta é ter de.”
This ciberduvidas article makes the same point
But this morning I was reading through (and trying to memorise) Mar Português by Fernando Pessoa and I noticed it has this couplet
Quem quer passar além do Bojador
Tem que passar além da dor
This looks like the great man is using tem que in exactly the way “os especialistas indicam” is wrong. Borrowing a phrase we sometimes use about Shakespeare, “I’d rather be wrong with Fernando Pessoa than right with Elsa Fernandes”, but I asked on Reddit to see if anyone else had thoughts on what might be going on. After all, the poem also includes an old-fashioned spelling of the words “rezaram” and “nele”, so maybe the language has drifted a bit since his day. It doesn’t seem so though.
“Ter que” is used a lot in Brazil, and as Elsa says, its increasingly common in colloquial speech in Portugal too. It’s technically wrong but seems to be one of those things that is used a lot. If teenagers and Fernando Pessoa are using it then it’s probably safe to call it a de facto standard. Best avoided in exams, but it seems as if it would be pedantic to pick someone up on it in normal conversation.
So what is “ter que” supposed to be for? It’s quite similar but it is more to do with ownership than obligation. So “tem muito que contar” means “he has a lot to tell”. In other words, he has a lot of experience, he’s an interesting guy. As opposed to “tem de contar muito” which means he’s obliged to tell you a lot.
Tenho muito que fazer = I have a lot on my plate
Tenho de fazer muito = I am being forced to do a lot
I had a complaint about the low quality of the pun in the title, so if you prefer you can think of it as “Ter Que’s Voting For Christmas”
I’m sorry.
So I came across this freaky verb today: “Reaver“. No, not rever, reaver. It’s based on the verb “haver” but with the re- prefix. Its h disappears because it would be silent anyway: re+[h]aver=reaver.
Haver is a weird verb to start with because it’s almost always used in the third person singular and it means something like “exists” or “there is”, but it has another meaning, which is “to have” or “to possess” and that’s the sense that’s used with reaver. It means “have again”, “recoup” or “get back”.
Cool, cool, cool, so let’s look for examples of it in use? Most likely form we’ll come across will be re+[h]á=reá, right?
Wrong! Reaver is a defective verb, meaning it doesn’t have a full conjugation. So even though the most-used form of haver is the third person singular present indicative form, that form doesn’t even exist for reaver. The only two forms Priberam’s conjugation allows in the present tense are the nós and vós forms.
Some examples of legitimate use are given in the dictionary entry
But if you look at some of the examples Priberam gives of the past-tense use of reaver you come across a citation of a page by Portugal rebelde blog:
Well… that’s *not* an example of the past tense of reaver though. That’s the present tense of “reouvir“, meaning to hear again, surely…? And so is this citation from a blog called French Kissin’, also cited by Priberam
Googling what I thought would be common forms of the verb, I didn’t really find many examples of it being used in the wild. So… It’s useful to know this exists in case it crops up in books but I don’t think I will be rushing to try and use this one in conversation!
If you’re hungry for more pain and suffering, you can find out more about reaver in this Ciberdúvidas article.
Portugalist is a sort of lifestyle and travel site with an informal, magazine vibe aimed at english-speaking visitors and residents in Portugal. I’ve tended not to pay much attention to it since I don’t travel much and don’t live there. I’ve just spent some time poking around though, and I must say, there’s some good stuff on there. Their bread-and-butter content is practical and seems very up-to-the-minute: how to get a covid vaccine, navigate finances and bureaucracy and so on. For those of us exiled beyond the sea and just wanting to learn the language, they have a modest-sized language section which doesn’t have much direct learning material but acts as a directory out to other sites and channels where you can find the right course.
Here are a few things I liked, in case you’re not already familiar with it
Some verbs have two past participles: one that forms part of compound verbs and one that is used primarily as an adjective
| Infinitive | Standard Participle | Shorter Participle |
| Acender | Tens acendido a vela? | A vela está acesa |
| Aceitar | Ele tem aceitado as desculpas | As desculpas foram aceitas |
| Eleger | Os americanos têm elegido Trump | O palhaço cor de laranja foi eleito |
| Ganhar | Eu tenho ganhado muito dinheiro | O jogo contra Ucrânia já está ganho |
| Pagar | Muito obrigado por ter pagado a conta | Não te rales, pai, a contas está paga |
| Expulsar | O governo tinha expulsado o embaixador | Não trabalhei e acabei por ser expulso |
Text with corrections from Dani Morgenstern. Notes at the bottom
O Espantalho
Litografia
Paula Rego tomou inspiração do dramaturgo Martin MacDonald. Na perspectiva dela “[…] a peça de teatro mexe* com religião… E a menina que queria ser Jesus… Que tinha muito a ver com o tema português também.” Esta litografia pode também representar a natureza paradoxal das consequências das nossas acções dentro dos nossos assuntos infelizes.
O Espantalho não é uma representação directa duma das cenas mais macabras da peça mas, com a sua imagem central dominadora dum espantalho crucificado, refere-se àquela parte da peça na qual a menina certinha, que faz sempre boas acções como se quisesse ser Jesus, perde os pais por causa dum acidente pelo qual, em** última análise, ela é que é culpada.
Ela é transferida para uns pais adoptivos sádicos*** que a tormentam com uma coroa de espinhos, uma chicotada e um cruz de madeira que ela tem de carregar (ela tem apenas 6 anos). Eles a perguntam se ou não ela quer ser Jesus e quando ela responde que sim, pregam-na ao cruz e voltam a perguntar se ou não ainda quer ser Jesus. A esta questão ela responda “Não, não *quero* ser Jesus, sou Jesus mesmo, caralho!” portanto, enfiam uma lança nas costas dela e o resto da história da crucificação desenrola-se no palco como antes.
*=hum… Na minha opinião “meddles with religion” não está bem traduzido porque ninguém fala assim em inglês. Julgo que é tradução de “mexer com” e não “interferir em”, e deve ser “touches on” em inglês, mas não faço ideia propriamente porque não li/ouvi as palavras originais da artista.
** =”em” not “na”. I was literally translating “in the final analysis” but it doesn’t need the article.
***=not “sadisticos”
I have an evernote page containing interesting and curious sightings of grammar in the wild that I wanted to think about later. I’ll try and make sense of them if I can, but I’m not absiolutely sure what they all mean to be honest, so if you’ve any suggestions I’d love to hear about them in the comments!
Cento e tantos degraus de escada é obra, mesmo para quem se apresenta com o cóccix em condições
I can’t remember where I turned this one up, but it mostly struck me because of the phrase “em condições” which obviously means “in good condition”, so that’s an idiomatic expression to keep in mind. It’s quite a grammatically interesting sentence though really. If I were to try and say that I’d be much more fromal and use more words. I would love to be confident enough to be this relaxed and groovy with my writing. “Cento e tantos” is unusal too. I’ve only ever seen “cento e tal” for “a hundred or so”.
Sabe que eles se podem desligar quando se quer, não sabe?
This sentence by Mario Zambudjal has two instances of “se” which seem to be different. In “se podem desligar” it’s reflexive: they can doisconnect themselves. And in “quando se quer” it’s putting the verb into passive mode, if I’m reading it correctly. “When required”. So putting it all together, “You know they can disconnect at will, don’t you?
Fiz figas para que não me esperassem situações semelhantes às que levaram o Valquerença, sete anos atrás, a riscar-me do quadro do pessoal
I think this is another one from Zambudjal. “Fiz figas” is interesting. It literally means “I made figs” but Gtranslate translates it to “I crossed my fingers”. Fazer figas is more like this in fact, according to the description in Priberam. The meaning is the same as crossing the fingers though: it’s meant to ward off bad luck.
A tua resposta pôs-me a cabeça à roda
This line from Lúcia Vaz Pedro’s Camões Conseguiu Escrever Muito para Quem Só Tinha um Olho… exemplifies an aspect of grammar that I can never quite get right. I’ve tried to use it a few times but screwed it up every time. It’s got the reflexive pronoun with Pôr but… why? It’s the head that’s spinning so why doesn’t she say “pós a minha cabeça a roda”? Why does it have a reflexive pronoun instead of a posessive pronoun? I asked my wife about this and she just said it’s how it works.
O que lhe passou pela cabeça…
This isn’t reflexive but in other ways, it’s similar to the one above. Why isn’t it just “passou pela cabeça dele/dela?” Why does it need the indirect object “lhe” when it looks like it needs a possessive? The possessive would give you more information. “Passed to him through the head”? Again. my wife just says that how it’s done. It’s a sense of actively passing through the person’s head and it is more grammatically accurate than using the possessive. I might need to sit and meditate on this for an hour or two, I think
Um teste às defesas da sala.
This sentence appears in Z by Manuel Alves. A test to the defences of the room. It’s an example of a preposition that’s used very differently in portuguese than it would be in english.
A perseguição aos Judeus
This one turned up in a history book. I would have expected it to be “dos” instead of “aos” for “The persecution of the Jews
Envolveu-o em operações especulativas tão ruinosas que o atirou para a bancarrota
This is from Vaticanum by Jose Rodrigues dos Santos. “Para” can be used for “to” in some contexts and “for” in others. In this one, it’s used for someone being thrown to bankruptcy. The guide unhelpfully defines “atirar para” as “lançar para”
Demasiado fatigado para se meter em explicações
Another one from Vaticanum. “meter-se em…” is equivalent to “get involved in”. he was too tired to get drawn into explaining himself to the cops.
Luso 