Lesson 23: Discovering 'werden'
Now, let's look at the three functions of 'werden' as an auxiliary verb. Returning to the dreams of the poor seal and turtle in Doris Lessing's wonderful novel "The Summer Before the Dark".
⟨werden + infinitive⟩: used to form the future
Sie saß in einem Kino. Sie sah einen Film, den sie schon zweimal im Wachzustand gesehen hatte. Gerade verfolgte sie die Sequenz mit der armen Schildkröte, die auf einer von einer Atombombe getroffenen Insel im Pazifik die Orientierung verloren hat, und statt ins Meer zurückzukehren, nachdem sie ihre Eier abgelegt hat, wie es die Natur gewöhnlich vorsieht, landeinwärts in eine wasserlose Einöde steuert, wo sie bald sterben wird.
She was sitting in a cinema. She was looking at a film she had, in waking life, seen twice. She was watching that sequence of the poor turtle who, on the island in the Pacific which has been atombombed, has lost its sense of direction and instead of returning to the sea after it has laid its eggs, as nature ordinarily directed, is setting its course inwards into a waterless land where it will die.
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⟨werden + past participle (Partizip II)⟩: used to form the passive
In welcher Jahreszeit werden kleine Seehunde geboren? → In which season are baby seals born?
This sentence is taken from an interactive exercise on Traumleser, based on the first part of The Summer Before the Dark by Doris Lessing. The exercise ends with a quiz that plays with your knowledge about a magnificent, sociable animal—yet one that is highly exposed to marine pollution: the seal.
🔗 Try the exercise here:
https://www.traumleser.com/en/de/exercises/interactive/dreams/30/29
⟨würde + infinito⟩: used to form the conditional
Vielleicht hatten einige der niedrigen, bitteren Büsche, die aus den Steinen wuchsen, heilende Wirkstoffe. Sie legte den Seehund vorsichtig hin, bückte sich nach unten und zur Seite und rupfte einige Buschtriebe aus. Sie kaute sie und spuckte die Flüssigkeit aus ihrem Mund auf die Wunden der Robbe. Es schien ihr, als würden diese schon heilen.
Perhaps some of the low bitter shrubs that grew from the stones had medicinal properties. She carefully laid down the seal, and she reached down and sideways and pulled some ends of a shrub. She chewed it, and spat the liquid from her mouth on to the seal’s wounds. It seemed to her that these were already healing.
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If you find the example sentences too complex, take the mini-courses, which will help you with German syntax and expand your vocabulary. Go to the list and select “The Summer Before the Dark”.
Bis nächsten Donnerstag!
Stephanie | Traumleser