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Easy Croaan (rev. 47b) / 86 More Verbs and Standing Outcomes 472 / 600

86 More Verbs and Standing Outcomes

I’ll explain several useful verbs and verb families here, and also introduce a couple of

advanced topics.

The first verb family is derived in this pattern:

tvoriti

o-tvarati («) ~ o-tvoriti («)

The base verb, tvoriti, is quite rare. The derived pairs are not:

prefix used with meaning

o- A open

pri- A leave ajar (‘almost close’)

za- A close

pre- A (u¨ A) transform

A create

s-

se² show up (colloq.)

There’s not much to say about the first three verbs: they express open and close –

either literal (window, shop), or metaphoric (discussion, person).

The last two verbs have specific meanings. The pre- verb is similar to transport verbs

derived by pre-: it uses destinations (expressed by u¨ + A) and optionally also origins

(expressed by iz¨ + G, matching the destination). The verb is used with either an

object in A, or a se² (mediopassively, if something transforms ‘on its own’):

Mali problem N se pretvorio u veliki A . A small problem has transformed into a big

one.

The verb pair otvarati («) ~ otvoriti («) open can illustrate a fine point when

perfective verbs are used and where not. If you opened a window, and then closed

it – and it’s a bit cold now in the room – and you want to express with a single verb

what you did, you would use the imperfective verb:

Otvarao sam prozor A . I opened the window. (It’s maybe closed now.)

If you use the impf. verb, it doesn’t imply that the window is open now, or that it

remained open for some time – but such things would be implied if you would use

the perf. verb:

Otvorio sam prozor A . I’ve opened the window. (And it’s open now.)

This is the ‘standing outcome’ principle. This is because perf. verbs focus on the

outcome, but the outcome – state of the window – is not relevant here (or not

expected). It’s important that you touched it. An obvious way to say it’s not open

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