Breakdown of Irgendwie war mir der Mann sofort sympathisch.
sein
to be
der Mann
the man
mir
me / to me (dative)
sofort
immediately
Questions & Answers about Irgendwie war mir der Mann sofort sympathisch.
Why does the sentence use the dative pronoun mir instead of ich?
This ties directly into this lesson! The adjective sympathisch requires the dative case to express who finds someone likeable. Literally, the German sentence is saying "The man was likeable to me."
Wait, if the English translation is "I found the man likeable," isn't "I" the subject?
In the English translation, yes. But in the German sentence, the subject is actually der Mann (nominative). The verb war agrees with it. Because sympathisch works backwards compared to English, the person being liked is the subject, and the person doing the liking is the dative object (mir).
Why is mir placed before der Mann? Shouldn't the subject come right after the verb?
Since the sentence starts with the adverb irgendwie, the verb war takes the second position. After the verb, German word order rules prefer to place pronouns (like mir) before full nouns (like der Mann). Pronouns are "lighter" and jump ahead, even if the full noun is the subject!
Does sympathisch mean "sympathetic"?
No, it is a classic false friend! sympathisch means "likeable," "pleasant," or "nice." If you want to say someone is "sympathetic" in the sense of showing compassion, you would use a word like mitfühlend.