German sentence construction
Many thanks once again to Rüdiger and Domasala for your replies. As always these are extremely informative (and very much appreciated).

I always realised that the concept of gender in German was important, but as you learn more you certainly do realise that knowing these are absolutely pivotal to understanding the language.

I wondered whether the different ways Domasala highlighted of phrasing this particular question are something that can be ‘learned’ in German.

For example the sentence ‘Es befinden sich Kreise auf ihm’ would translate in English as ‘It finds itself creases on it’ which we would simply not say. We would not for example, use the phrase ‘it finds itself’- that sounds very formal, stilted and long-winded to English ears!!

Is this way of constructing the sentence guided by grammatical rules or rather something that a native speaker (or a very experienced German speaker) would ‘just know’?

Laura
Daniel

I just wanted to say a big thank to you for excellent answer to this question - your answer is extremely helpful.

By the way, I tried to message you to say thanks but for some reason the messaging service is blocked (any ideas why??) Well thanks anyway!!

Laura

Question

German sentence construction
Many thanks once again to Rüdiger and Domasala for your replies.  As always these are extremely informative (and very much appreciated).  

I always realised that the concept of gender in German was important, but as you learn more you certainly do realise that knowing these are absolutely pivotal to understanding the language. 

I wondered whether  the different ways Domasala highlighted of phrasing this particular question  are something that can be ‘learned’ in German.

 For example the sentence ‘Es befinden sich Kreise auf ihm’  would translate in English as ‘It finds itself creases on it’ which we would simply not say.  We would not for example, use the phrase ‘it finds itself’- that sounds very formal, stilted and long-winded to English ears!!

Is this way of constructing the sentence guided by grammatical rules or rather something that a native speaker (or a very experienced German speaker) would ‘just know’?

Laura
Daniel

I just wanted to say a big thank to you for excellent answer to this question - your answer is extremely helpful.  

By the way, I tried to message you to say thanks but for some reason the messaging service is blocked (any ideas why??) Well thanks anyway!!

Laura

Answer

Hi Laura,

in fact it is guided by grammatical rules. If I am correct, it is called a 'Fakultativ' and it can refer to a subject in 3rd person or a complete subsentence. I would say it is used to emphasize the subject a bit more.

Let's take your example:
"Es befinden sich Kreise auf ihm"

could also be said 'regularly' as:
"Kreise befinden sich auf ihm"

or putting the object to the 1st position:
"Auf ihm befinden sich Kreise"

If however you want to emphasize the "Kreise" even more, you can use that Fakultativ. you simply add it to the sentence, put it to the 1st position and arrange the rest accordingly (namely the subject goes to the position after the verb):
"Es befinden sich Kreise auf ihm"

Just remember: If you use the "Es" as Fakultativ as it's done here, it has to be on the first position, otherwise it doesn't work. That doesn't apply to the "Es" as pronoun, of course.

If you ask me, if there is a rule to know -when- to use it, I couldn't formulate one. It's - as often - a matter of feeling about the language. However, pointing out a subjet could be a possibility. The sound of it is mostly formal, sometimes even a bit artificial.

"Die Frau trinkt." could be put to:
"Es trinkt die Frau" which sounds like a sophisticated, artificial way to speak, which sometimes can be fitting (thinking of poems, e. g.)


As for the case with the complete subsentence:
"Dass du traurig bist, tut mir leid."
something like "I'm sorry for you being sad."

or:
"Es tut mir leid, dass du traurig bist."

Here the "Es is referring to the complete subsentence, i. e. the fact that "you are sad" 

Hope I could help. If you have any further questions, don't hesitate to ask, and I will try to explain a bit more understandable! ;)

Daniel

P. S. Whoa, now I see, I didn't answer in the correct post, I guess. Hope this still finds you. :)

Answer

Oh.... 

from the other answers, now I see, that you were probably referring to "sich befinden" as your main problem and question. Correct? well, I hope, that you can still put my answer to good use. :)

Daniel