Learn Hardcore Icelandic: Stelpan grætur stundum yfir bíómyndum, þó að hún viti að þær séu bara sögur. - The girl sometimes cries at movies, although she knows that they are just stories.

Stelpa is the basic noun meaning “girl” (indefinite).
Icelandic usually puts the on the end of the noun as a suffix, not as a separate word.

For feminine nouns in the nominative singular, the definite ending is -n:

stelpa = a girl
stelp-an = the girl

So stelpan is “the girl” and is in the nominative case as the subject of the sentence.

Why is the verb grætur used, and not the infinitive gráta?

Gráta is the infinitive: “to cry”.

In a normal sentence you need a finite verb that agrees with the subject.
The subject here is stelpan (3rd person singular), so you use the 3rd person singular present tense:

infinitive: gráta – to cry
1st person sg: ég græt – I cry
3rd person sg: hún grætur – she cries

So you get Stelpan grætur… = The girl cries / The girl is crying…

What does yfir mean here, and why is it used with gráta?

Literally, yfir means “over”. But like English “cry over something”, in Icelandic gráta yfir e-u means:

“to cry over something / to cry because of something”

It’s a fairly common pattern with emotion verbs:

hlæja yfir e-u – laugh about something
reiðast yfir e-u – get angry about something

So gráta yfir bíómyndum is “to cry over movies / because of movies”.

Why is bíómyndum in that form, and what is its base form?

The base form (nominative singular) is bíómynd – “movie, film”.

In the sentence we have yfir bíómyndum. Two things are going on:

Plural
She cries over more than one movie ⇒ plural.
Case: dative
The preposition yfir takes dative when it describes a state/location or cause, not movement.
Emotional uses like gráta yfir e-u typically use the dative.

So bíómynd (feminine) in the dative plural is:

nominative plural: bíómyndir
dative plural: bíómynd-um

Hence yfir bíómyndum = “over movies” (dative plural).

Where can stundum go in the sentence? Is Stelpan grætur stundum… the only option?

Stundum means “sometimes” and is an adverb. Icelandic word order follows a V2 rule in main clauses: the finite verb is normally the second element.

The given sentence:

Stelpan grætur stundum yfir bíómyndum…

is perfectly natural: subject – verb – adverb.

Other common options:

Stundum grætur stelpan yfir bíómyndum…
(Here stundum is in first position; the verb grætur still comes second.)

Less typical but still possible:

Stelpan grætur yfir bíómyndum stundum.

What you can’t do in neutral word order is move stundum in front of grætur while keeping stelpan first, e.g.:

✗ Stelpan stundum grætur yfir bíómyndum… (sounds wrong in standard Icelandic)

So: keep the finite verb in second position, and place stundum either right after the verb or at the very beginning of the sentence.

What does þó að mean, and is it the same as þótt?

Þó að is a conjunction meaning “although, even though”.

þó að hún viti… – although she knows…

Þótt (and þótt að) is essentially the same word, just a more contracted/older form. In modern Icelandic:

þó að hún viti…
þótt hún viti…
þótt að hún viti…

all mean “although she knows…” and are all accepted.

You can also drop að:

þó hún viti…
þótt hún viti…

The important thing is: this conjunction normally triggers the subjunctive mood in the clause that follows.

Why is it hún viti and not hún veit for “she knows”?

The verb vita = “to know (a fact)”. Its present indicative and subjunctive differ:

indicative: hún veit – she knows
subjunctive: hún viti

Conjunctions like þó að / þótt (að) (“although, even though”) normally require the subjunctive in standard Icelandic, because they introduce a concessive clause (something true, but in contrast to what we might expect).

So:

Ég veit að þær eru bara sögur.
I know that they are just stories. – indicative (neutral statement)

But:

Þó að hún viti að þær séu bara sögur…
Even though she knows they are just stories… – subjunctive, because of þó að.

In casual speech some Icelanders do use the indicative here (þó að hún veit…), but if you’re learning the language, it’s safer and more correct to stick to hún viti after þó að.

Why is it þær séu instead of þær eru?

The verb vera (“to be”) has:

indicative: þær eru – they are
subjunctive: þær séu

In this sentence, að þær séu bara sögur is a clause inside the larger þó að-clause:

þó að hún viti [að þær séu bara sögur]

Because the whole block is under þó að, it is natural (and stylistically neat) to keep the subjunctive mood throughout the embedded clause as well: viti… séu.

If you pull that clause out on its own, you would normally use the indicative:

Ég veit að þær eru bara sögur. – I know that they are just stories.

So:

Inside a þó að-clause: …hún viti að þær séu bara sögur.
In a neutral sentence with vita: Ég veit að þær eru bara sögur.

You may hear að þær eru bara sögur even in the original sentence (especially in speech), but the version with séu matches the more traditional/subjunctive style triggered by þó að.

Why is the pronoun þær used for “they”? Why not þeir or þau?

Icelandic they has three different forms, depending on gender:

þeir – they (masculine plural)
þær – they (feminine plural)
þau – they (neuter plural)

The noun bíómynd (movie) is feminine, and we are talking about movies in general (plural). So the pronoun that refers back to bíómyndir / bíómyndum must be feminine plural:

bíómyndir … þær – movies … they

Hence þær is the correct “they” here.

There are two að in þó að hún viti að þær séu bara sögur. Do they mean the same thing?

No, they have different functions:

þó að – one unit
- Here að is part of the conjunction þó að = “although, even though”.
viti að þær séu…
- Here að is a complementizer meaning “that”, introducing a clause after the verb vita:
  - hún veit að þær eru… – she knows that they are…

Both are written að, but:

in þó að, it belongs to the conjunction,
after viti, it’s just the word “that” linking the verb to what is known.

What does bara mean here, and does it change the meaning much?

Bara is an adverb meaning “just, only, merely, simply.”

þær séu bara sögur = “they are just stories / only stories.”

It adds a downplaying or minimizing nuance: movies are “nothing more than” stories.
If you leave it out:

þær séu sögur – “they are stories”

This is still true, but it loses the idea that this is not a big deal, or that the stories are in some way less serious or less real.

So bara is not grammatically required, but it adds important tone.

Why is sögur in the plural, and could I say something like bara saga instead?

The base noun is saga – “story”.

In the sentence we have:

subject of the clause: þær – “they” (plural)
complement: sögur – “stories” (plural nominative)

In Icelandic, the predicative complement often agrees with the subject in number and case. Since þær is nominative plural, the noun is also nominative plural:

singular: saga – a story
plural nominative: sögur – stories

So:

þær séu bara sögur – literally: “they are just stories.”

If you said að þær séu bara saga, you would be mismatching:

þær (they, plural) with saga (story, singular) ⇒ ungrammatical.

To say “it’s just a story” about a single film, you could say instead:

Hún veit að hún er bara saga. – She knows it is just a story.
(Here the subject is hún referring to one movie.)

Is the comma before þó að necessary?

Standard Icelandic punctuation does normally place a comma before a conjunction introducing a subordinate clause, especially when that clause comes after the main clause:

Stelpan grætur stundum yfir bíómyndum, þó að hún viti…

You will see some variation in modern writing (some people use fewer commas), but:

A comma here is correct and recommended,
It helps show the boundary between the main clause and the “although” clause.

So you should definitely feel comfortable writing the comma before þó að in this kind of sentence.