Learn Hardcore Finnish: Eilen olin kirjoittanut esseen valmiiksi, ennen kuin katsoin televisiota. - Yesterday I had finished writing the essay before I watched television.

“Olin kirjoittanut” is the past perfect (pluperfect) in Finnish. It describes an action that was already completed before another past action.

Olin kirjoittanut esseen valmiiksi, ennen kuin katsoin televisiota.
→ I had written / had finished writing the essay before I watched TV.

If you said:

Eilen kirjoitin esseen valmiiksi, ennen kuin katsoin televisiota.

both actions are just in the past; the order is still clear from “ennen kuin”, but you don’t emphasise the “already finished earlier” feeling as strongly as with olin kirjoittanut.

So olin kirjoittanut highlights that the writing was completed prior to the TV watching, from a past point of view.

How is “olin kirjoittanut” formed, and what does it literally mean?

Olin kirjoittanut = “I had written” (past perfect).

It’s formed with:

The verb olla (to be) in the imperfect (past)
→ olin = I was
The active past participle of the main verb
→ kirjoittanut = written

So literally it is like saying “I was written”, but in Finnish this combination means “I had written”.

Pattern (1st person example):

olen kirjoittanut = I have written (present perfect)
olin kirjoittanut = I had written (past perfect)

General pattern:

olla in present → have done
olla in past → had done

Why is it “esseen” and not “essee” after kirjoittanut?

Esseen is the genitive form of essee.

Finnish objects often appear in:

Genitive when the action is completed / total (you finish the whole thing)
Partitive when the action is ongoing, incomplete, or unbounded

Here, the essay is finished:

olin kirjoittanut esseen valmiiksi
→ I had written the (whole) essay to completion

If the action were incomplete, you’d use the partitive:

olin kirjoittanut esseetä
→ I had been writing (some of) the essay (not necessarily finished)

So esseen shows that the essay is treated as a complete, finished object.

What does “valmiiksi” mean here, and why that form?

Valmiiksi is the translative case of valmis (ready, finished).

The translative -ksi often means “into a state / into something”.
So:

esseen valmiiksi = “(the) essay into a finished state”

Literally: I had written the essay into finished.
Meaning: I had finished writing the essay.

With some verbs, using -ksi expresses the resulting state:

maalata seinä valkoiseksi = paint the wall white
keittää perunat kypsiksi = boil the potatoes until they are cooked

Here:

kirjoittaa essee valmiiksi = write the essay until it is ready

Could I just say “Eilen kirjoitin esseen valmiiksi, ennen kuin katsoin televisiota”? What’s the difference?

Yes, that sentence is grammatical and natural.

Difference:

Eilen kirjoitin esseen valmiiksi, ennen kuin katsoin televisiota.
→ Simple narration in the past. The order comes from ennen kuin.
Eilen olin kirjoittanut esseen valmiiksi, ennen kuin katsoin televisiota.
→ Emphasises that the essay was already completed by the time you watched TV, from a past reference point.

In many everyday contexts, Finnish speakers would happily use the simple past version.
The past perfect just adds a bit more “already done earlier” nuance, similar to the difference between:

I wrote the essay before I watched TV.
I had written the essay before I watched TV.

Why is there a comma before “ennen kuin”?

In Finnish, subordinate clauses are usually separated from the main clause by a comma.

Main clause: Eilen olin kirjoittanut esseen valmiiksi
Subordinate clause introduced by conjunction: ennen kuin katsoin televisiota

Rule: Put a comma before conjunctions such as että, koska, vaikka, kun, jos, ennen kuin, jälkeen kun, etc. when they introduce a subordinate clause.

So the comma before “ennen kuin” is required by standard Finnish punctuation rules.

Why is it “ennen kuin” and not just “ennen”?

Finnish distinguishes between:

ennen + noun / nominal phrase
- ennen iltaa = before evening
- ennen tenttiä = before the exam
ennen kuin + finite clause
- ennen kuin katsoin televisiota = before I watched TV
- ennen kuin menen nukkumaan = before I go to sleep

Since “katsoin televisiota” is a full clause (with a finite verb and subject), you need ennen kuin, not just ennen.

Wrong:
✗ ennen katsoin televisiota

Correct:
✓ ennen kuin katsoin televisiota

Why is the second verb just “katsoin” and not “olin katsonut” too?

We normally use past perfect for the action that happened earlier, and simple past for the later past action.

Earlier past: olin kirjoittanut esseen valmiiksi
Later past: katsoin televisiota

If you said:

Eilen olin kirjoittanut esseen valmiiksi, ennen kuin olin katsonut televisiota.

this would sound strange, because it suggests both actions are seen as completed before some even later reference point. The natural “timeline anchor” here is simply you watching TV, so that one stays in simple past.

So:

earlier action → past perfect (olin kirjoittanut)
reference past action → simple past (katsoin)

Could you also say “ennen kuin olen katsonut televisiota” or something with the present?

Yes, in other contexts you can get different tense combinations:

En katso televisiota, ennen kuin olen kirjoittanut esseen valmiiksi.
→ I won’t watch TV before I have finished the essay.

Here the main clause is about present/future, and the subordinate clause uses present perfect to show the required completed state.

In your original sentence, everything is in the past, so:

Completed earlier past: olin kirjoittanut
Later past reference point: katsoin

That tense combination is the natural one for a fully past narrative.

Why is it “katsoin televisiota” and not “katsoin television”?

Televisiota is the partitive form of televisio.

With the verb katsoa (to watch), Finnish often uses partitive when you’re talking about:

Watching TV in general
Watching for some indefinite time
Not a clearly delimited “whole thing”

So:

katsoin televisiota
→ I watched TV (for some time; in general, not necessarily from start to end of a specific program)

Using television (genitive-accusative) can suggest watching some “whole” identifiable thing (like a specific program) and is less idiomatic with televisio in this general sense. More natural for a complete program would be:

katsoin ohjelman = I watched the (whole) program

So katsoin televisiota is the standard way to say “I watched TV”.

What’s the difference between “eilen” and “eilinen”? Why is it “Eilen olin kirjoittanut…”?

eilen = yesterday (adverb of time)
→ Eilen olin kirjoittanut… = Yesterday I had written…
eilinen = yesterday’s (adjective-like, or a noun meaning “yesterday’s thing/day”)
→ eilinen essee = yesterday’s essay
→ Eilinen oli kiireinen päivä. = Yesterday was a busy day.

In your sentence you need an adverb of time, so eilen is correct:

Eilen olin kirjoittanut esseen valmiiksi…
Not: Eilinen olin kirjoittanut… (ungrammatical).

Can the word order be “Olin eilen kirjoittanut esseen valmiiksi…”? Does the meaning change?

Yes, Olin eilen kirjoittanut esseen valmiiksi, ennen kuin katsoin televisiota is also correct.

Basic idea:

Finnish word order is flexible; you often put at the beginning whatever you want to emphasise or set as the topic.
Eilen olin… puts more focus on “yesterday” as the time frame.
Olin eilen… is slightly more neutral; “yesterday” is just extra information in the middle.

Both mean the same in content: yesterday, the essay was already finished before you watched TV. The difference is mainly in information structure / emphasis, not in core meaning.