Breakdown of Solange er hier arbeitet, benimmt sich dieser Besserwisser, als gehörte ihm die Firma.
er
he
hier
here
arbeiten
to work
dieser
this / that (fem.: diese, neut.: dieses)
gehören
to belong to
ihm
him / it / to him / to it (dative)
die Firma
the company
der
who, which, that (relative pronoun; die, das)
solange
as long as
der Besserwisser
the know-it-all
sich benehmen
to behave (manners)
als
as if (irreal comparison)
Questions & Answers about Solange er hier arbeitet, benimmt sich dieser Besserwisser, als gehörte ihm die Firma.
Why does the verb gehörte come immediately after als?
In unreal comparisons, you can use als ob (as if), which kicks the conjugated verb to the very end of the clause. However, as this lesson shows, you can drop the ob and just use als. When you do this, the verb must immediately follow als in the first position of the clause. So als gehörte ihm die Firma means the exact same thing as als ob ihm die Firma gehörte.
gehörte looks like the simple past form of gehören. Why is it used here?
It is actually not the past tense, but rather the Konjunktiv II (subjunctive) form used for unreal situations! For regular (weak) verbs like gehören, the Konjunktiv II form happens to be completely identical to the simple past form. We know it is expressing a hypothetical situation because of the als comparison, not because it happened in the past.
Why does the dative object ihm come before the subject die Firma in the final clause?
The verb gehören (to belong to) requires a dative object, which is ihm here. When the object is a short, known pronoun and the subject is a full noun (die Firma), German strongly prefers to put the short pronoun right after the verb. This makes the sentence flow much better than als gehörte die Firma ihm.
Why does the reflexive pronoun sich come before the subject dieser Besserwisser?
The first clause (Solange er hier arbeitet) takes up position one, so the main clause must start with its verb (benimmt). The verb for to behave is reflexive in German: sich benehmen. Just like in the previous question, German prefers to place a short, lightweight pronoun like sich immediately after the verb, pushing a heavier, full noun subject like dieser Besserwisser further back.
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