Breakdown of Meine Mutter sagt, Brokkoli und Blumenkohl seien gesund, aber mein Bruder isst lieber eine Banane.
Questions & Answers about Meine Mutter sagt, Brokkoli und Blumenkohl seien gesund, aber mein Bruder isst lieber eine Banane.
Seien is the Konjunktiv I form of sein. It is often used in German for reported speech or indirect speech.
So here, Meine Mutter sagt, Brokkoli und Blumenkohl seien gesund means that this is what the mother says. The speaker is reporting her statement, not necessarily presenting it as a plain fact.
- sie sind gesund = they are healthy
- sie seien gesund = she says they are healthy
This is especially common in more formal German, writing, and journalism.
Yes, in everyday German many speakers would say:
Meine Mutter sagt, Brokkoli und Blumenkohl sind gesund.
That is very common in conversation.
The version with seien sounds more like formal reported speech. It creates a little more distance between the speaker and the statement. It is not saying the statement is false; it just marks it as someone else’s claim.
The comma separates the main clause from the clause that follows it.
- Meine Mutter sagt = main clause
- Brokkoli und Blumenkohl seien gesund = reported-speech clause
German uses commas more regularly than English to mark clause boundaries. After verbs like sagen, denken, glauben, and similar verbs, a following clause is often separated with a comma.
German often allows reported speech without dass.
So these are both possible:
- Meine Mutter sagt, Brokkoli und Blumenkohl seien gesund.
- Meine Mutter sagt, dass Brokkoli und Blumenkohl gesund sind.
The first version is a more direct kind of reported speech and often goes well with Konjunktiv I like seien.
The second version with dass is very common too, especially in everyday speech.
Here they are being talked about in general, as types of food, not as specific individual items.
That is why German often leaves out the article:
- Brokkoli ist gesund.
- Blumenkohl ist gesund.
This is similar to English when we say Broccoli is healthy rather than The broccoli is healthy, if we mean broccoli in general.
If you meant specific vegetables, you could use articles:
- Der Brokkoli im Kühlschrank ist noch frisch.
- Der Blumenkohl ist teuer gewesen.
Because Banane here is a countable singular noun, and the sentence means that he likes to eat a banana.
So:
- mein Bruder isst lieber eine Banane = my brother prefers to eat a banana
With singular countable nouns, German usually needs an article or another determiner.
Compare:
- Ich esse gern Banane ❌
- Ich esse gern Bananen ✅ = I like eating bananas
- Ich esse eine Banane ✅ = I am eating a banana
So the article is needed because it refers to one banana.
Lieber means preferably, rather, or more gladly.
It is related to gern, which is used to express liking doing something:
- Ich esse gern Brokkoli. = I like eating broccoli.
- Ich esse lieber eine Banane. = I’d rather eat a banana. / I prefer to eat a banana.
So lieber is basically the comparative form used with verbs:
- gern = gladly / like to
- lieber = rather / prefer
Here it shows a preference: the brother prefers a banana over broccoli and cauliflower.
Because German main clauses usually follow the verb-second rule.
In the clause:
aber mein Bruder isst lieber eine Banane
the elements are:
- aber
- mein Bruder
- isst
- lieber
- eine Banane
More importantly, within the clause itself, the finite verb isst comes in the normal main-clause position: after the subject.
- mein Bruder isst ...
The adverb lieber usually comes later, before the object here.
A very natural pattern is:
- subject + verb + lieber + object
Because aber is a coordinating conjunction, not a subordinating one.
Coordinating conjunctions connect two equal clauses, and the second clause keeps normal main-clause word order:
- ..., aber mein Bruder isst lieber eine Banane.
So the verb stays in its usual main-clause position.
Compare that with a subordinating conjunction like weil:
- ..., weil mein Bruder lieber eine Banane isst.
After weil, the verb goes to the end.
So:
- aber → normal main-clause order
- weil, dass, obwohl → verb goes to the end
The subjects are in the nominative case:
- Meine Mutter
- mein Bruder
The direct object is in the accusative case:
- eine Banane
In this sentence, eine looks the same in nominative and accusative because Banane is feminine:
- nominative: eine Banane
- accusative: eine Banane
So you do not see a form change there, but grammatically it is the accusative object of isst.
Because all nouns are capitalized in German.
That includes:
- Mutter
- Brokkoli
- Blumenkohl
- Bruder
- Banane
This is one of the most noticeable spelling rules in German. If a word is a noun, it gets a capital letter, even in the middle of a sentence.
It is treated as plural, because two things are joined by und.
That is why the verb form is plural:
- Brokkoli und Blumenkohl seien gesund
Even though each noun by itself is singular, together they form a plural subject.
Compare:
- Brokkoli ist gesund.
- Blumenkohl ist gesund.
- Brokkoli und Blumenkohl sind gesund.
- In indirect speech: Brokkoli und Blumenkohl seien gesund.
Because both are subjects of their clauses, so they are in the nominative case.
- Meine Mutter sagt ...
- ... aber mein Bruder isst ...
The forms meiner Mutter or meinen Bruder would be used in other cases, depending on the grammar of the sentence.
For example:
- Ich helfe meiner Mutter. = dative
- Ich sehe meinen Bruder. = accusative
But here both are doing the action, so nominative is correct.