The Afterput Also

Photo by Cederic Vandenberghe on Unsplash

Afterput:

la postmetita “ankaŭ”

the “also” which is put after [something]
[from “post” (after) + the verb “meti” (to put) in its past participle “ita” form]

Aside from the delicious conciseness of “postmetita” (after-put), there’s a nice point in this section of the PMEG (which everyone by now should know is practically my Esperanto holy book).

Usually the word “ankaǔ” (“also” / “too”) is used immediately before the term it’s related to:

sciuroj (kaj ankaǔ meloj) ĉeestas la feston

squirrels (and also badgers) attended the party

But there are circumstances where that’s not the case – where it can appear after. And that’s usually after pronouns (I, she, they, etc.).

ili ankaǔ jam faris ruzajn planojn

they too had made cunning plans

Then the PMEG goes on to say that this is worth avoiding if there’s any chance of misunderstanding. And that got me wondering what structures could lead to misunderstanding, given that this seems like such a natural structure in English.

And I think the answer is when there’s a different possible meaning if the “also” were to apply to the following word instead – which doesn’t happen so much in English, no doubt because we’d use “also” instead of “too”. Let’s use an example…

mi ankaǔ amas ŝin

I too love her

Or is that “I also love her”? Does that mean 1. “I love her” in addition to someone else loving her? Or 2. is it that “I love her” in addition to some other emotion I feel toward her? In other words, does “ankaǔ” apply to “mi” (1) or does it apply to “amas” (2)- there’s the ambiguity.

Therefore, if we mean 1, we could say “ankaǔ mi amas ŝin” to eliminate the other possible interpretation.

If you’re curious, the other common place for an afterput also is with the “ki-” words:

la melestro alvenis, kaj nun ĉiuj atendas la sciureston, kiu ankaǔ estis malfrua

The leader of the badgers arrived, and now everyone is waiting for the leader of the squirrels who too was late

Unless the “also” is related to the entire sub-phrase or a multiword phrase (rather than just the “ki-” word):

la melo estis perforta kiam li estis kolera, kaj ankaǔ kiam li estis feliĉa

The badger was violent when he was angry and also when he was happy

To me, it often seemed to come down to “kiu” having the “also” afterput, and the other “ki-” words having it beforeput, but maybe that’s just my limited imagination!

Enjoying the Moment

Photo by Kalen Emsley on Unsplash

Here’s a few musings that occurred to me as I read a particularly neat term recently:

antaŭĝoji = to look forward to

(an-tou-JO-yee, “ou” as in “ouch”)

I do love a ŭ followed by a circumflexed letter; it really does make a pleasant squiggle, which here is then also complemented nicely by the double dots that follow across the i and j.

la meloj antaŭĝojis la kvietan nokton

the badgers looked forward to the quiet night

Our term’s main component is “ĝoji”, which means “to rejoice” or “to be glad/happy”, from the same origin as English “joy”. It appears here with the term “antaŭ” as a prefix, which otherwise when appearing alone and friendless, means simply “before” or “in front of”. It is often used as a prefix with a similar meaning to the English prefix “pre-“:

antaŭjuĝi = to prejudge | antaŭjuĝo = prejudice

from “juĝi” = “to judge”

So you might think of “antaŭ-ĝoji” as “pre-enjoying” (pre-joying, pre-happying). And that immediately gets me wondering what other prefixing mischief I can substitute in there for a giggle. How about:

postĝoji

to enjoy something having happened? post-enjoying? post-happying?

“Post” is the opposite of “antaŭ” – it means “after” (or “behind”). So the gladness is on the other side of the nice event – we’re no longer looking forward it, we’re looking backward to it.

mi lacege postĝojis la grandan manĝon

I exhaustedly enjoyed the large meal [already in my belly]

Perhaps like a kind of nostalgia or afterglow?

ili kune enlite postĝojis

Together in bed, they enjoyed the afterglow

Though that’s its verb form, which I quite like, so it sounds cooler – more like “they afterglowed together”. We could use the noun form to render the English sentence more exactly, but then we’d have to use a verb like “enjoyed” or “felt” to convey the idea via the noun:

ili kune enlite ĝuis/ĝojis/sentis la postĝojon

Change the verbal ending to an “o” for the noun form, and don’t forget the “n” since it’s the direct object of the verb!

But we’ve skipped over the actual enjoyable bit, so how about we go back with:

nunĝoji = to enjoy the moment (enjoy the now)

from “nun” = “now”, literally, “to enjoy now”

Slap it in a sentence:

Ĉesu tropensi kaj simple nunĝoju!

Stop overthinking and just enjoy the moment (the -u ending makes a verb into a command)

Well I think that’s pretty neat, ĉu ne?

And here’s a few bonus “antaŭ”-prefixed terms. When building words using antaŭ, if “pre-” doesn’t work as a translation in your mind, you could think of “fore-” or “beforehand” as alternatives:

antaŭscii

to know beforehand, pronounced: an-toust-SEE-ee

antaŭdiri

to foretell

antaŭafikso

prefix