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A German Question | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
| t.chippendale Newbie United StatesRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5236 days ago 6 posts - 6 votes Speaks: English* Studies: German | Message 1 of 6 29 July 2010 at 3:30am | IP Logged | ||
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I want to address this issue once and for all. I know in German one cannot literally translate "it was fun" (Es war Spaß). One must say "I had made fun" (Es hat Spaß gemacht).
I have also heard this applied to examples such as having stress. One does not have stress, but grammatically one make stress. Ich habe Stress gemacht. Oder, ich mache Stress. Is this correct? Or should one just use "anspannen" instead? Are there other examples that follow this same structure? Or is it just with having fun? Thanks! 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| nuriayasmin Senior Member Germany Joined 5245 days ago 155 posts - 210 votes  | Message 2 of 6 29 July 2010 at 4:48am | IP Logged | ||
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In connection with "stress" you can say:
Ich habe Stress mit meiner Freundin or Ich habe Stress bei der Arbeit You may tell someone: Mach dir doch nicht so einen Stress or Mein Chef macht Stress But you wouldn't say "Ich mache Stress" because it would mean that you're actively and consciously doing something negative (causing stress). A sentence like "Ich mache mir unnötigen Stress" is possible, though. 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| t.chippendale Newbie United StatesRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5236 days ago 6 posts - 6 votes Speaks: English* Studies: German | Message 3 of 6 29 July 2010 at 5:06am | IP Logged | ||
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Thank you, that clears some stuff up.
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| astein Pentaglot Groupie Germany Joined 5270 days ago 80 posts - 134 votes Speaks: English*, German, Italian, French, Mandarin Studies: Russian, Dutch | Message 4 of 6 29 July 2010 at 1:44pm | IP Logged | ||
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Also, it works a little differently in colloquial situations. You can definitely say, "ich bin total gestresst", but I don't think you would find that written in any fancy novels. There are also other words that work as substitutions, like beansprucht, and belastet. These generally seem to work a little better for your purpose than trying to Germanize our English expression, but that is just my experience.
There are plenty of examples like Spaß machen (although I am having trouble thinking of any), as in they are things applied to you (in dative form) from some unknown source. For example "Es läuft mir kalt über den Rücken", "Angst machen", "Es hat mir Ehre gemacht", or "Ärger machen". However, you simply have to learn them as they come, because they are sometimes just as variable as English. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Doitsujin Diglot Senior Member Germany Joined 5322 days ago 1256 posts - 2363 votes Speaks: German*, English | Message 5 of 6 29 July 2010 at 3:38pm | IP Logged | ||
"Es hat mir Ehre gemacht", though not technically wrong, if "es" refers to a person, sounds somewhat old-fashioned. You're more likely to find "seinem Namen [alle] Ehre machen" (=live up to one's name). 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| astein Pentaglot Groupie Germany Joined 5270 days ago 80 posts - 134 votes Speaks: English*, German, Italian, French, Mandarin Studies: Russian, Dutch | Message 6 of 6 29 July 2010 at 4:48pm | IP Logged | ||
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Yeah, I have never heard anyone say that, but I remember reading it somewhere. I think it was actually "Es machte ihm Ehre, dass..." or something.
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