Breakdown of Warum der Sitzplan fehlt, ist überraschenderweise kein Problem.
sein
to be
kein
no, not any
das Problem
the problem
warum
why
fehlen
to be missing
der
who, which, that (relative pronoun; die, das)
überraschenderweise
surprisingly
der Sitzplan
the seating plan
Questions & Answers about Warum der Sitzplan fehlt, ist überraschenderweise kein Problem.
Why is the verb ist directly after the comma? Shouldn't there be a subject like das before it?
The entire indirect question Warum der Sitzplan fehlt acts as the subject of the main sentence. In German, a whole clause can occupy Position 1. Because the main verb must always be in Position 2, ist immediately follows the comma. You don't need a placeholder like das here, though in spoken German you might sometimes hear people add it (..., das ist kein Problem).
How does the word überraschenderweise break down?
It comes from the present participle überraschend (surprising) combined with the suffix -erweise (in a ... manner / way). Adding -erweise to an adjective creates an adverb that comments on the whole sentence, similar to the English suffix "-ly" in words like "surprisingly" or "luckily" (glücklicherweise).
Why is the verb fehlt at the end of the first clause instead of right after Warum?
Because Warum der Sitzplan fehlt is an indirect question. Unlike a direct question (Warum fehlt der Sitzplan?), an indirect question is a subordinate clause, which means the conjugated verb gets pushed to the very end of that clause.
I usually see fehlen used with a dative person, like Mir fehlt etwas. Why is there no dative here?
The verb fehlen is often used with a dative person to mean "to be missed by someone" (e.g., Du fehlst mir means "I miss you"). However, it can also be used on its own simply to mean "to be absent" or "to be missing". Here, der Sitzplan fehlt just means "the seating plan is absent" without specifying who is missing it.
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