German Made Simple: Learn to Speak and Understand German Quickly and Easily (53 page)

Wortschatz

der Osten
east;
der Westen
west

die Mauer
pl
. -
n
wall

der Krieg
pl
. -
e
war;
der Frieden
peace

die Geschichte
pl
. -
n
story, history

die Stadt
(
shtătt) pl
.
¨
-
e
city

der Zufall
pl
.
¨
-
e
coincidence

glauben
to believe

passieren
to happen

schlagen
to hit, beat, defeat

teilen
to divide

trennen
to separate

umarmen
to hug

weinen
to cry

zerstören
to destroy

herzlich
kind, warm, hearty

histórisch
historical

lebendig
lively, vivid

Wichtige Redemittel

mit Vergnügen
with pleasure

es ist mir bekannt, es ist mir klar
it is evident (clear) to me

es ist ihm
(ihr, Ihnen
, etc.)
klar
it is evident to him (to her, to you, etc.)

aus beruflichen Gründen
for professional reasons

aus privaten (persönlichen, finanziellen, zeitlichen) Gründen
for personal (private, financial, temporal) reasons

Grammar Notes and Practical Exercises

1. THE PRESENT PERFECT TENSE (= “DAS PERFEKT”)

The present perfect tense in English is formed by the auxiliary verb
have +
the past participle of a verb. Thus:
I have learned; you have worked; he has seen; they have spoken
. Observe the present perfect tense in German:

a. The
Perfekt
of most verbs in German is formed by the auxiliary
haben
+
the past participle of the main verb
.

b. The verb
“sein”
and all intransitive verbs indicating a
change of place or a change of condition
take the present of the auxiliary
sein
(
ich bin
,
etc.) in the
Perfekt
.
An intransitive verb is a verb that does not take an object. Examples from our text are:
Ich bin … gegangen; Ich bin … gewesen
.

c. The past participle stands at the end of a simple sentence or main clause
.

2. FORMATION OF THE PAST PARTICIPLE

Weak (Regular) Verbs

Strong (Irregular) Verbs

a. The past participle of weak verbs is formed by adding
-t
or
-et
to the infinitive stem and prefixing
ge-
.
The ending
-et
is used when the stem ends in
-t
or
-d
, and after certain consonant groups, for ease in pronunciation (
ge-arbeit-et, ge-red-et, ge-rechn-et, ge-öffn-et
).

b. The past participle of strong verbs has the ending
-en
and the prefix
ge-
.

c. Verbs with separable prefixes form their past participles like the simple verbs, and the prefix
ge-
stands between the separable prefix and the verb
(aufgemacht, angesehen
).

d. Verbs with inseparable prefixes
(be-, emp-, ent-, er-, ge-, ver-, zer-)
do not add the prefix
ge-
to the past participle
(verkauft, verstanden
).

Exercise 123

Find all the past participles of the text “
Die Wiedervereinigung Deutschlands
” and assign them to the correct column in the grid.

Exercise 124

Complete these sentences with the past participle of the verb in parentheses.

Beispiel: 1. Er hat die neuen Wörter gelernt
.

  
1. Er hat die neuen Wörter (lernen
).

  
2. Ich habe ihn heute nicht (sehen
).

  
3. Sie haben gut (antworten
).

  
4. Hat Heinrich schwer (arbeiten)?

  
5. Er hat gestern einen Brief (schreiben
).

  
6. Hast du das Porträt (ansehen)?

  
7. Der Tisch ist hier (stehen
).

  
8. Die Schüler haben gut (rechnen
).

  
9. Die Jungen haben zu viel (reden
).

10. Niemand hat Deutsch (sprechen
).

11. Wann haben Sie das Auto (verkaufen)?

12. Sie hat einen neuen Hut (kaufen
).

3. THE PRINCIPAL PARTS OF VERBS

Weak Verbs (Regular). No Vowel Change in Stem Vowel

All weak verbs have a like pattern, so that it is not necessary to memorize the principal parts of each verb separately.

The principal parts of strong verbs have vowel changes and must be memorized. A foreigner learning English has a similar problem. He must learn the irregular verb forms such as:
speak, spoke, spoken; give, gave, given; write, wrote, written
; etc.

4. USE OF THE PAST (“PRÄTERITUM”) AND PRESENT PERFECT (“PERFEKT”) TENSES

In German both the past and present perfect are used to express
past time
. Thus the German
Perfekt
resembles the English present perfect tense only in the way it is formed, but
not
in its use!

In conversation the present perfect is generally used.

However, to narrate a sequence of events, the past tense is preferable.