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Re: The phrase 'I'd like...'

From:Carsten Becker <post@...>
Date:Monday, January 12, 2004, 17:38
Maybe I'm a little late with my response and it has already been answered
what I'm writing... It's just about "Ich möchte".

From: "Andreas Johansson" <andjo@...>
To: <CONLANG@...>
Sent: Sunday, January 11, 2004 12:43 PM
Subject: Re: The phrase 'I'd like...'


Quoting Roger Mills <romilly@...>:

> > I seem to recall that the French equivalent is "Je voudrais . . ." > literally > > "I would want . . ." That strikes me as a slightly less indirect way of > > getting the point across. > > > And Spanish yo quisiera, Germ. ich möchte (?)(subjunctives) , probably
Ital.
> io vorebbe (?)...(conditional, like French) > > > German indeed has _ich möchte_ and so on. It's pretty literally "I would > like" - cf indicative _ich mag_ "I like". > > Andreas
Yes, "je voudrais" is conditionel I (future I + imparfait). As for German, I don't know what mood "ich möchte" is, I must admit. I don't believe ?möchten exists ... *looks up in the Duden* ... no, it doesn't exist (although wouldn't be impossible I think!). I haven't got an etymologic dictionary at hand, so then I *guess* "möchte" comes from "mögen" (to like). Would be sensible, because indicative = mögen, past = mochte, Konjunktiv I = ich möge, Konjunktiv II = ich möchte(/würde mögen*). The Konjunktiv II forms are always derived from the past form, Konjunktiv II is derived from the indicative form. Besides, you can also say "Ich hätte gerne ..." (I would like to have... => I'd like (to have)...). So from my assumptions: "ich möchte" is subjunctive and thus kind of an indirect expression. *) "möchte" as Konjunktiv II is, only possible in the "I'd like..." construction. Otherwise it would be misunderstood. Cf. "Er behauptet, sie möchte keine Kinder." and "Er behauptet, sie würde keine Kinder mögen." ("He claims she does not want (to have) any children." vs "He claims she would not like children.") [jO:s], ["ka:stn= "bEk6] ... never sure how to represent the <r> in "Carsten" in IPA.

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Andreas Johansson <andjo@...>