Breakdown of Uusi käsikirjoitus on parhaillaan tekeillä.
olla
to be
uusi
new
käsikirjoitus
manuscript
parhaillaan
currently
tekeillä
in the making
Questions & Answers about Uusi käsikirjoitus on parhaillaan tekeillä.
What exactly is tekeillä and how is it formed?
tekeillä means "in the making" or "in the works". It is built from the verb tehdä (to do/make) using a noun-like stem teke- and adding the plural adessive ending -illä. It acts as an adverbial showing that the subject is currently undergoing a process.
The lesson mentions these words often take a possessive suffix. Why is there no possessive suffix on tekeillä here?
When the subject of the sentence is the inanimate thing being acted upon (like the manuscript), words like tekeillä or suunnitteilla (in the planning) do not take a possessive suffix. They simply describe the state of the object. If you added a possessive suffix here, it would imply the manuscript itself is actively doing the making, which doesn't make sense.
parhaillaan looks like it has the same grammatical structure as the lesson topic. Is it related?
Yes! parhaillaan is formed from the plural adessive of the adjective paras (best), which is parhailla-, plus the third-person possessive suffix -an. While its literal roots mean "at its best", it is used as a fixed adverb meaning "currently" or "at this very moment". It pairs perfectly with ongoing process adverbials.
Could I use a standard verb structure like the third infinitive instead of tekeillä?
Because a manuscript cannot make itself, you cannot say käsikirjoitus on tekemässä. You would have to change the sentence into the passive voice: Uutta käsikirjoitusta tehdään parhaillaan (A new manuscript is currently being made). Using on tekeillä is an elegant, native-sounding way to describe something as being "under construction" while keeping the sentence in the active voice.
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