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Nu de baby de speen kwijt is, troost de vader hem.

Nu de baby de speen kwijt is, troost de vader hem.
Now that the baby has lost the pacifier, the father is comforting him.
From Lesson 280:Clauses of circumstance (nu)·Dutch

Questions & Answers about Nu de baby de speen kwijt is, troost de vader hem.

Why does the first clause end with is?
In this sentence, nu means "now that" and acts as a subordinating conjunction. Subordinate clauses in Dutch always use verb-final word order, so the conjugated verb is gets pushed to the very end of that clause.
Why do we use is for "has lost"? Shouldn't it be heeft?
In Dutch, the standard way to say you have lost something is with the expression iets kwijt zijn (literally "to be lost of something"). Because the expression uses the verb zijn (to be), you say the baby is the pacifier lost, rather than using hebben (to have).
Why does the second part of the sentence start with the verb troost instead of de vader?
This is an example of inversion. The entire "now that" clause takes up the first position in the sentence. Because the main verb must always be in the second position (the V2 rule), troost comes immediately after the comma, followed by the subject de vader.
Why does the sentence use hem (him) to refer to the baby?
The word baby is a de-word in Dutch. When referring back to a de-word for a person of unknown gender, Dutch speakers generally use masculine pronouns like hij (he) and hem (him).

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