Word
Het voortdurende verbouwen maakt ons gek.
Meaning
The constant renovating drives us crazy.
Part of speech
sentence
Pronunciation
Course
Lesson
Questions & Answers about Het voortdurende verbouwen maakt ons gek.
Why do we use het before verbouwen, which is normally a verb?
This is a substantival infinitive, which means we are using the entire verb as a noun to describe the activity itself. When infinitives are turned into nouns this way, they are always neuter, meaning they always take het.
Why does voortdurende have an -e at the end if it describes a het word?
Adjectives modifying a het word only drop the -e ending if they follow een (a/an) or if there is no article at all. Because this sentence uses the definite article het (the), the adjective keeps its standard -e ending: het voortdurende verbouwen.
Why is the verb maakt singular here? Doesn't 'constant renovating' imply multiple actions?
Even if the activity involves many steps or happens repeatedly, an infinitive acting as a noun is always treated as a single, abstract concept. Therefore, the subject het verbouwen takes the singular verb maakt.
The English translation says 'drives us crazy'. Why doesn't the Dutch sentence use a verb for 'to drive'?
In Dutch, the English idiom 'to drive someone crazy' is expressed with gek maken (literally: to make someone crazy). Verbs like rijden or besturen are strictly used for physically operating a vehicle.