Thread: Откуда берётся злоба?

Originally Posted by Throbert McGee

My sense as a non-native is that either of these might be better, to emphasize the existence of злоба in the here-and-now:

"Откуда берётся злоба?" (present tense: "Where does malice come from?")
"Откуда взялась злоба?" (past perfect: "Where did/has malice come from?")

The form you used suggests to me "Where might it come from in the future?"

P.S. And note that злоба is closer to "spitefulness" or "malice directed against another person"; if you mean "Evil" in a more general sense, like "the Dark Side of the Force," зло might be better.

Yes, берется was used in the song lyrics because the singer is referring to the present. I translate it as "hate" because it makes more sense to me that way. "Malice" isn't a commonly used word. Reflexive verbs always confused me. I was taught (by myself) that reflexive verbs are used when the subject is referring to itself, yet I still fail to use them properly.

Originally Posted by maxmixiv

Yes, it could be simple Future (from where spitefulness will take itself?),

or as Throbert said, part of a conditional sentence:
Откуда возьмётся иммунитет, если постоянно пить антибиотики?
(excuse my English) How can you expect to have a good immunity while drinking antibiotics on a regular basis?

Ah, I see. Since the translation includes "How", "expect", "to have", "good", yet those words are nowhere to be found in the original sentence, it's extremely confusing. Having that said, it most certainly make sense, but more in literal terms.

So essentially we can use this phrase "Откуда возьмется что-либо..." to ask where something originates from. The verb just reinforces the root meaning of "Откуда." If I recall correctly, if you want to ask someone where they're from, you just say "Откуда вы?" and that's enough. Literally "From where are you?" If you were to add the verb here, would it just be wrong?

Originally Posted by Alex80

P.S.
Yes and I do not see it as odd. "...is taken from..." is very same as "...come from...". This reflexive form may not contain subject (he who takes).
I think something similar exists in english "They say ...". Russian-speaking mind immidiately asks "who are they?". Russian form of this sentence is something like "it is said".

That's true, but no one would say it that way in English, so it sounds odd to me. I thought "They say" was simply "Говорят." We can say "It is said" in English too. They're used almost interchangeably. They do have different tones though. "It is said" sounds like exposition. "They say" could be used more in every-day conversation.