Mario
Ich habe es tun wollen. One of the audio programmes to learn German I am studying with, introduces the sentences: Ich habe es tun wollen. Ich habe es nicht tun können. Why is it possible to use what seems to be the infinitive form of the verbs wollen and können with "haben" which, as far as I understand, should be followed by a past participle, not an infinitive? Are these sentences possible with the past participle? If so, what is the difference in meaning o use of both? Thanks for your replies.
Jul 23, 2014 5:19 AM
Answers · 8
1
Good question. I am pretty sure, you have learnt somehow, with the modal verbs you must use Präteritum for the past tense. That is not completely right. In most of the time, we use the Präteritum (simple past), but is does also exist the Perfekt-form, and here we are: Both your sentences are past tense just using the Perfekt. So the meaning is: Ich wollte es tun. Ich konnte es nicht tun. The strange thing is that they use 2 infinitive forms, so that is why this is called the double infinitive: haben + Inf. +Inf. And another thing is, they always need 'haben', never 'sein', even with verbs as gehen, fahren etc. Gestern habe ich nach München fahren müssen. Aber im gesprochenen Deutsch ist das Präteritum vorzuziehen: Gestern musste ich nach München fahren.
July 23, 2014
That's called »Ersatzinfinitiv«, it's only used with certain verbs (modal ones, for example). See: http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ersatzinfinitiv http://www.canoo.net/services/OnlineGrammar/Wort/Verb/Finit-Infinit/Part2.html
July 23, 2014
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Mario
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