Harry Potter y los Tiempos Verbales de la Muerte*
I mentioned in the previous post that only one of my two weekend projects was Snape-related, but on second thought, why can’t studying for my final involve Snape as well? Please join me as I attempt to master and differentiate twelve, count ‘em, twelve Spanish verb tenses by using them to describe major Snape-related events from the Harry Potter series.
Come share with me the pain of the Spanish subjunctive, a shadow set of verb tenses that seemingly exist for no other reason than that the rulemaking dudes at the Royal Spanish Academy were unable to accept doubt, desire, and emotion as legitimate subjects for standard human language to address.
And if you happen to habla or escribe español yourself, by all means jump in and correct my errors! ¡Do it now, before it’s too late! (My final is on Tuesday night.) I am also open to nerdy discussions on the finer points of second-year Spanish grammar.
“¡No me llames cobarde!” A perfect example of a negative tú command in action!
In the beginning, there were only three verb tenses, all indicative, and life was simple and idyllic.
The present indicative:
(This is the most basic tense, so I’ve picked a kind of hard verb, dar, for practice.)
Snape le da detención a Harry con frecuencia.
Snape often gives Harry detention.
The preterite, used to express completed actions in the past:
Voldemort lo trajo Snape a la Casa de los Grites para matárlo.
Voldemort brought Snape to the Shrieking Shack to kill him.
The imperfect, used to express habitual actions in the past:
Como estudiante, a Snape le gustaba hacer cambios a su libro de texto pociónes.
As a student, Snape liked to make changes to his potions textbook.
I had achieved only the most tentative, fragile knowledge of how to conjugate these three tenses when the subjunctive came at us like a fucking freight train.
The present subjunctive:
Snape no cree que Harry pueda aprender Oclumancía.
Snape does not believe that Harry can learn Occlumency.
(If the sentence were just “Harry can learn Occlumency,” you would use puede, the regular present form. But because doubt is being expressed, a whole new conjugation of the verb poder with different, “wrong” endings is required.)
The imperfect (past) subjunctive (BTW, why do half these verb tenses have more than one name?!):
Snape no creía [that’s the imperfect, since Snape’s disbelief was habitual] que Harry pudiera aprender Occlumency.
Snape did not believe that Harry could learn Occlumency.
Then there are the perfect tenses. I never even knew what any of this shit was in English, OK?
The present perfect indicative:
Snape ha matado a Dumbledore.
Snape has killed Dumbledore. (You would say this at the end of Half-Blood Prince, since it had just happened. But by the time of Deathly Hallows, you’d say Snape mató a Dumbledore, in the preterite, since by then it would be a completed action fully in the past.)
The pluperfect (past perfect) indicative:
Draco ya no había podido matar a Dumbledore cuando Snape lo hizo en lugar.
Draco had already failed to kill Dumbledore when Snape did it instead.
(The pluperfect is weird; you almost can’t use it without yolking it to a subordinate clause in the preterite. The usual example textbooks give is “Pedro had already done X when Luisa did Y.”)
Whereas if Snape lived in an alternate universe in which, for some reason, he DID want to be called a coward (a Snarry universe, perhaps?), he would use an affirmative tú command, which has a different ending and attaches the direct object to itself: “¡Llámame cobarde!”
You’d think two perfect tenses would be enough, but noooo, we need subjunctive versions of each.
The present perfect subjunctive:
Snape está infeliz [OMG emotion!! Subjunctive coming up!!] que Slytherin haya perdido la Copa de la Casa.
Snape is unhappy that Slytherin has lost the House Cup.
The pluperfect (past perfect) subjunctive:
Snape estaba infeliz que Slytherin hubiera perdido la Cupa de Casa.
Snape was unhappy that Slytherin had lost the House Cup.
And don’t forget the conditional perfect!:
Si Snape no le dijiera [past subjunctive required here after “si”!! “Si” expresses doubt!!] a Voldemort que Harry era el Eligido, los Potters no habrían muerte.
If Snape had not told Voldemort that Harry was the Chosen One, the Potters would not have died.
Oh, wait, I skipped the regular conditional! I nearly fucked up on the last exam by forgetting that this tense even existed until five minutes before the tests were collected. I can’t imagine why I would ever forget about any of these highly useful, not at all specialized, totally distinct verb tenses, but there you have it:
Si Dumbledore no le retuviera [past subjunctive!] información, Snape sabría de la Varita de Saúco.
If Dumbledore did not keep information from him, Snape would know about the Elder Wand.
And finally, the future, which thankfully is pretty easy:
Snape vivirá todavía en el fanficción.
Snape will live on in fanfiction.
Indeed, espero que [oh fuck, I just triggered the subjunctive! Honestly, I didn’t mean to!] el futuro [oh my God, what do I use here? The future subjunctive? Is there such a thing? According to my Internet crutch, verbix.com, there apparently is.] ESTUVIERE más fácil para ambos Snape y yo.
I.e., I hope the future will be easier for both Snape and me. ¡Ay Dios mío!, I really do.
*i.e., Harry Potter and the Verb Tenses of Death
Come share with me the pain of the Spanish subjunctive, a shadow set of verb tenses that seemingly exist for no other reason than that the rulemaking dudes at the Royal Spanish Academy were unable to accept doubt, desire, and emotion as legitimate subjects for standard human language to address.
And if you happen to habla or escribe español yourself, by all means jump in and correct my errors! ¡Do it now, before it’s too late! (My final is on Tuesday night.) I am also open to nerdy discussions on the finer points of second-year Spanish grammar.
“¡No me llames cobarde!” A perfect example of a negative tú command in action!
In the beginning, there were only three verb tenses, all indicative, and life was simple and idyllic.
The present indicative:
(This is the most basic tense, so I’ve picked a kind of hard verb, dar, for practice.)
Snape le da detención a Harry con frecuencia.
Snape often gives Harry detention.
The preterite, used to express completed actions in the past:
Voldemort lo trajo Snape a la Casa de los Grites para matárlo.
Voldemort brought Snape to the Shrieking Shack to kill him.
The imperfect, used to express habitual actions in the past:
Como estudiante, a Snape le gustaba hacer cambios a su libro de texto pociónes.
As a student, Snape liked to make changes to his potions textbook.
I had achieved only the most tentative, fragile knowledge of how to conjugate these three tenses when the subjunctive came at us like a fucking freight train.
The present subjunctive:
Snape no cree que Harry pueda aprender Oclumancía.
Snape does not believe that Harry can learn Occlumency.
(If the sentence were just “Harry can learn Occlumency,” you would use puede, the regular present form. But because doubt is being expressed, a whole new conjugation of the verb poder with different, “wrong” endings is required.)
The imperfect (past) subjunctive (BTW, why do half these verb tenses have more than one name?!):
Snape no creía [that’s the imperfect, since Snape’s disbelief was habitual] que Harry pudiera aprender Occlumency.
Snape did not believe that Harry could learn Occlumency.
Then there are the perfect tenses. I never even knew what any of this shit was in English, OK?
The present perfect indicative:
Snape ha matado a Dumbledore.
Snape has killed Dumbledore. (You would say this at the end of Half-Blood Prince, since it had just happened. But by the time of Deathly Hallows, you’d say Snape mató a Dumbledore, in the preterite, since by then it would be a completed action fully in the past.)
The pluperfect (past perfect) indicative:
Draco ya no había podido matar a Dumbledore cuando Snape lo hizo en lugar.
Draco had already failed to kill Dumbledore when Snape did it instead.
(The pluperfect is weird; you almost can’t use it without yolking it to a subordinate clause in the preterite. The usual example textbooks give is “Pedro had already done X when Luisa did Y.”)
Whereas if Snape lived in an alternate universe in which, for some reason, he DID want to be called a coward (a Snarry universe, perhaps?), he would use an affirmative tú command, which has a different ending and attaches the direct object to itself: “¡Llámame cobarde!”
You’d think two perfect tenses would be enough, but noooo, we need subjunctive versions of each.
The present perfect subjunctive:
Snape está infeliz [OMG emotion!! Subjunctive coming up!!] que Slytherin haya perdido la Copa de la Casa.
Snape is unhappy that Slytherin has lost the House Cup.
The pluperfect (past perfect) subjunctive:
Snape estaba infeliz que Slytherin hubiera perdido la Cupa de Casa.
Snape was unhappy that Slytherin had lost the House Cup.
And don’t forget the conditional perfect!:
Si Snape no le dijiera [past subjunctive required here after “si”!! “Si” expresses doubt!!] a Voldemort que Harry era el Eligido, los Potters no habrían muerte.
If Snape had not told Voldemort that Harry was the Chosen One, the Potters would not have died.
Oh, wait, I skipped the regular conditional! I nearly fucked up on the last exam by forgetting that this tense even existed until five minutes before the tests were collected. I can’t imagine why I would ever forget about any of these highly useful, not at all specialized, totally distinct verb tenses, but there you have it:
Si Dumbledore no le retuviera [past subjunctive!] información, Snape sabría de la Varita de Saúco.
If Dumbledore did not keep information from him, Snape would know about the Elder Wand.
And finally, the future, which thankfully is pretty easy:
Snape vivirá todavía en el fanficción.
Snape will live on in fanfiction.
Indeed, espero que [oh fuck, I just triggered the subjunctive! Honestly, I didn’t mean to!] el futuro [oh my God, what do I use here? The future subjunctive? Is there such a thing? According to my Internet crutch, verbix.com, there apparently is.] ESTUVIERE más fácil para ambos Snape y yo.
I.e., I hope the future will be easier for both Snape and me. ¡Ay Dios mío!, I really do.
*i.e., Harry Potter and the Verb Tenses of Death