"Leanfaidh muid suas arís iad le fáíl amach cén fadhb a bhí ann"

Just wondering how does this stack up in yer eyes? Is the start of this heavy Béarlachas or is this natural enough Irish? Would you hear it in Gaeltacht?
(I'm not the author of this by the way!!)

Ní dóigh liomsa go bhfuil sé nádúrtha. Tá sé focal ar fhocal le nath smolchaite béarla.

Rachaidh muid i dteagmháil leo arís
labhróidh muid arís leo

Rud éigin mar sin.

Thanks Aonghus- it didn't make sense to me- I'm used of being confused when it's Irish written by a good writer anyway, but this was a different kind of confusion!

When you're learning it's confusing as hell- you really have to pick your sources to learn from at the beginning.

I don't like the "le" in the middle - why not chun?

Is féidir ceachtar rud a rá.

Ha!

Buaileann sé an Ifreann amach as roinnt m'aistriúcháin...

quote:

I don't like the "le" in the middle - why not "chun"?

Oh dear! Ní maith le David Webb "le". Bhuel, "le" is mó a deirtear i nDún na nGall, agus tá sé chomh "caighdeánach" céanna le "chun". So, yah boo sucks, David!

Hugo-

I started this thread for a bit of help in my ongoing work and effort in learning Irish. Do you get that? Daltaí is a friendly and civilised forum where we all try to help each other out.

You have just hijacked my thread, and turned it into something negative. I avoid negative people like you in my life and so I am asking you NOT to post in my threads from this point forward unless you have something non-sarcastic and constructive to add to the discussion.

Seo, seo! Nach sílfeá go mbeadh múineadh ort, a Hugo? Níor inis DW ach a thuairim.

I think there is a lot of confusion about le versus chun in certain types of sentence - and it has not been cleared up in my mind. Is it a standard vs. dialects thing, or is it a Béarlachas vs. traditional Irish thing, or is it a regional thing? Maybe Hugo or other people could advance opinions on this. My impression from reading PUL is that chun is more common, but I doubt that I "checked" every instance of those two words. I can do a word search, but le and chun are so common, it could take hours to extract all relevant instances.

I am familiar with: tá orm le + VN (I am to do something, have something to do)

chun: in order to

All I can say is that the "fáil amach" is not Béarlachas in that sentence - or if it is, it is of very long standing. The leanaim suas "follow up" may be Béarlachas, and I don't know the status of the le.

I am gradually adding to my list of phrases that look like Béarlachas but are actually good Irish: see http://www.corkirish.com/wordpress/idioms-that-remind-one-of-english-idiom . There are many there that would seem like obvious Béarlachas. I would not be 100% that leanaim suas was Béarlachas (although other thread participants probably are 100% on that subject).

Look at this recent "finding":

Do phioc cuid des na buachaillíbh suas an t-eólus go tiugh: some of the boys picked up the knowledge quickly.

(Message edited by david_w on April 24, 2010)

And fadhb is feminine - many learners make this mistake.
So "the problem" = an fhadhb :-) (pronounced roughly "an ibe").

Davidw- as Aonghus said above- le and chun are both used for that meaning 'to'.

They are both in the dialects, and both are in the caighdeán. It's uncomplicated.

To be honest, it's the first part of the sentence that shocked me.

Also re. pioc suas- it's perfectly good- I've heard it used by the best native speakers on Ros na Rún.

But if you are going to pick something up, like a tv, then I would use the likes of "fá choinne". There are couple of other compound prepositions for that meaning of 'pick up' that we use in English.

quote:

"Leanfaidh muid suas arís iad le fáíl amach cén fadhb a bhí ann"

The flaw in this sentence is "suas". Irish did not -- at least until now -- follow the English "follow them up" literally. I'm not even sure it is acceptable English.

Two ways to improve the Irish: forget about the "suas" and use the subjunctive / modh foshuiteach to express the purpose clause.

Leanfaimid orainn leo go bhfeice muid cén fhadhb a bhí ann.

Cuirfimid scairt / glao eile orthu go ...
Cuirfimid r-phost eile chucu go ...
Tabharfaimid cuairt eile orthu go ...

"Suas" would be taken literally in Irish: up a stairs, up a tree, up a hill etc.

Taidhgín, "to follow something up" is good English. But on the point of the Irish "suas", there are many examples where suas is not literal in Irish. The page on my site I referred to has these examples:

Óir do chuir a máthair suas chuige í.

Níor bh’ fhéidir cur suas leis.

Do phioc cuid des na buachaillíbh suas an t-eólus go tiugh.

It is more than possible that these idioms originated in English (or that the corresponding English idioms originated in Irish even), but as these were being written by Peadar Ua Laoghaire in 1915, they are not recent imports from English.

Thanks for that perspective Taidhgín!

I am having a nice chilled out weekend, apart from my head being wrecked with this cár mó stuff!! I can't help being slightly obsessed with Irish though..

Anyway did anyone watch Winning Streak (I know I know :) ) but hey it's actually a bit of craic seeing the short films they make of contestants and their families to introduce them on the show!

But yeah there was a guy there this evening and he only speaks Irish to his family, and they speak back in English. He has never spoken English to them and insists on Irish! Only on Winning Streak eh :) Actually the camera kept going back to the poor guy!

Bheadh "cur suas leis" agamsa freisin.

Ach tá leagain eile nach nglacfainn leo: "Tá sé suas agatsa" (Fútsa atá sé) nó "Leanúint suas"

Is fíor duit áfach maidir leis an deacracht Béarlachas a aithint.

quote:

I am gradually adding to my list of phrases that look like Béarlachas but are actually good Irish ...

Keep in mind also that Irish and English have a shared history. They both we're greatly influenced by Norman French. They both we're influenced by Latin. And of course, they influenced one another directly. It may be difficult to find out who influenced who in every case, because that may be lost now. It's never easy to define where Béarlachas begins. Now I think people overcorrect in order to not sound or write like its "Béarlachas". People are a bit "touchy". Probably the best measure is if it sounds natural, which is what the natives sense when they say "there is just something not right about that". They say the same thing when a (essentially) made-up Irish word is put in place over an English word fully incorporated into the language. But there's the rub, because the "native sense" is the hardest part to develop!

David_w

OK. So "cuir suas" and "pioc suas" are long established. What of "lean suas". I doubt it.

The first one "Óir do chuir a máthair suas chuige í."seems to mean "because her mother sent her up to him" and that is OK because it is the other meaning of "suas"

I still think "leanfaimid suas é" is wrong unless they mean they are following someone on a climb up up up Eyjafjallajokull. [Maith go leor. Admhaím gur chóipeáil is gur ghreamaigh mé é. :-)]

Anyway, I'm learning. Leanaimis orainn. If I were to don a different cap I would say don't worry about Béarlachas. Get out the dictionary and string words together and let us see what happens. If communication takes place well and good. Wouldn't that be better than silence. Disinterest. Disregard. Distain. Béarlachas is only a tiny defect in the grander scheme of things relating to the revival, maintenance or death of Irish.

Taidhgín, the context of "óir do chuir a máthair suas chuige í" is the passage in St Matthew's Gospel where Herod's daughter asks for the head of John the Baptist on a plate. "Her mother put her up to it".

You can see the context, in Matthew 14, on my website at http://www.corkirish.com/wordpress/archives/336 . Note that I am transcribing the Gospels translated by PUL, and these are not the Maynooth Bible. I have completed Matthew and done most of Mark.

I think you are right about leanaim suas - it doesn't exist. Leanaim de, leanaim ar and leanaim le all exist.

quote:

Béarlachas is only a tiny defect in the grander scheme of things relating to the revival, maintenance or death of Irish.

Translating every idiom word for word from the dominant language is what happens with dying languages... just before they die.
Idioms are what make languages interesting and original. If you translate every idiom word for word from English, just speak English, it'll be easier...

Is comhairle maith é sin, a Lughaidh, don scríbhneoir/cainteoir. Ach maidir leis an léitheoir/éisteoir, ní mór dó a bheith ar a airdeall roimh ró cheartú!