Thread: perfective of бояться?

what is it?[/i]

побояться

thanks!

is there like an online dictionary or a dictionary that i can buy that lists the imperfective/perfectives of verbs?

https://www.seelrc.org:8443/russ/index.jsp

There is no single perfective for this verb, just as for many others. The idea that Russian verbs have a perfective and an imperfective form is just plain wrong, and this is a good example why.

"pobojat'sja" is a strange word, one can I guess imagine something like "my nemnogo pobojalis', no potom perestali" meaning that we were afraid for a short while and then stopped (perhaps by persuading ourselves that things were not that scary), it is still a bit weird. But it has only that very narrow meaning.

Ubojats'ja is probably a more common word but it would work only in limited context too (this time usually meaning that being afraid prevented smo. from doing smth.)

One can write half a dozen or more of other verbs like that. Which one would be correct would depend on the context. Quite likely something like "ispugat'sja" would fit better, or maybe not.

убояться-устаревшее слово

Не верь, не бойсяяяяяяяяяяяяяяяяяяяя!

but i thought that for each verb there was a regular perfective which has no other significant meaning from the imperfective verb other than the fact that it is perfective. And that all the other forms of the verb add other meanings to it.

such as:

говорить (imperf.) - to speak
сказать (perf.) - to speak
поговорить (perf.) - to chat/have a talk

so говорить has one regular perfective form...but it has other perfective forms that add different meaning.

да?

Originally Posted by TATY

Не верь, не бойсяяяяяяяяяяяяяяяяяяяя!

Не проси!

Originally Posted by TATY

Не верь, не бойсяяяяяяяяяяяяяяяяяяяя!

This brings to mind a question I always had. In English, if you want to write unnaturally long vowels, we usually just repeat the vowels, like: "helloooooooooooooooo? Anyone heeeeeeeeeere?". That works fine for English vowels, but not all Russian ones. I know "неееееееееееет" is normal, but wouldn't "Бойсяяяяяяяяяяяяяяя" be a repeat of the 'ya' sound "boisyayayayayayaya"??? Question is, should one write "Бойсяааааааааа"?

kalinka, в общем-то все равно как написать. Можно "бойсяяя", можно "бойсяааа". Все равно тот, кто читает, произнесёт про себя как надо

угу. спасибо!

Originally Posted by zomby_pengy

but i thought that for each verb there was a regular perfective which has no other significant meaning from the imperfective verb other than the fact that it is perfective. And that all the other forms of the verb add other meanings to it.

such as:

говорить (imperf.) - to speak
сказать (perf.) - to speak
поговорить (perf.) - to chat/have a talk

so говорить has one regular perfective form...but it has other perfective forms that add different meaning.

да?

well, no, you thought wrong.

Skazat' is definitely much narrower than govorit', it's closer in meaning to English "to tell" than to "to speak". For one, "skazat'" requires a specific indirect object (i.e. the thing you told him/her about), while "govorit'" does not, and in fact often conveys (to me, at least) a feeling that there was no such single object.

You can see it yourself with your example -- both "skazat'" and "pogovorit'" add different meanings, which one should be used in a particular context depends on the specifics of the action, but you can not replace either one with the other even though both roughly correspond to the imperfective "govorit'".

Originally Posted by zomby_pengy

but i thought that for each verb there was a regular perfective which has no other significant meaning from the imperfective verb other than the fact that it is perfective. And that all the other forms of the verb add other meanings to it.

such as:

говорить (imperf.) - to speak
сказать (perf.) - to speak
поговорить (perf.) - to chat/have a talk

so говорить has one regular perfective form...but it has other perfective forms that add different meaning.

да?

Говорить / Поговорить = to speak

Cказать = to say

They are different verbs in Russian, as they are in English.

As a previous poster said, saying that Russian verbs are in pairs - one perfective and one imperfective is highly inaccurate.

A lot of verbs have a "neutral perfective", but they also have lots of other perfective forms. Also many many verbs have so-called "secondary imperfectives".

If two verbs look VERY different they are no the same verbs.

Сказать is a prefixed form of казать (which isn't really used in Russian), and where verbs like Показать (to show) come from.

The true imperfective of Сказать is Сказывать.

Originally Posted by zomby_pengy

but i thought that for each verb there was a regular perfective which has no other significant meaning from the imperfective verb other than the fact that it is perfective. And that all the other forms of the verb add other meanings to it.

such as:

говорить (imperf.) - to speak
сказать (perf.) - to speak
поговорить (perf.) - to chat/have a talk

so говорить has one regular perfective form...but it has other perfective forms that add different meaning.

да?

For most verbs this is true (although in some cases, one perfective can cover two imperfectives or vice versa - consider укладываться/уложиться/улечься). Бояться, however, is a state of mind, which corresponds to an imperfective verb. Думать and подумать have a similar relationship to бояться and побояться, or любить or жить. Perfective verbs tend to be associated with tangible things, not a state of mind (which fear most certainly is), since a state of mind is an indeterminate process. Therefore you can't have an perfective verb with an "almost identical" meaning to the imperfective, since there is no perfective sense.

Often verbs with different meaning and different origins and roots can become close in meaning and end up being lumped together by speaker and grammarians as an aspectial pair. Hence you get pairs like

Говорить / Сказать

But note that even in English "to talk" and "to say" are different verbs with different meanings.

Talking and Speaking is a general action (and intransitive)
To say is transitive (I said SOMETHING).

Originally Posted by TATY

The true imperfective of Сказать is Сказывать.

Сказывать - очень редкое слово. Его разве что в старых текстах (сказках) можно узреть (Типа - скоро сказка сказывается да не скодо дело делается).
Зато очень распространено слово "сказываться" с несколько другим значением