Dia tidak mau gagal lagi besok.

he/she

Breakdown of Dia tidak mau gagal lagi besok.

• tidak: not
• mau: want
• besok: tomorrow

Questions & Answers about Dia tidak mau gagal lagi besok.

Does tidak mau mean “doesn’t want to” or “won’t” here?

It primarily means “doesn’t want to / is not willing to.” With controllable actions, tidak mau can imply “won’t/refuses” (e.g., Dia tidak mau pergi = He won’t/refuses to go). With gagal (to fail), “refuse” is odd, so the natural reading is “doesn’t want to fail.” To express a prediction/promise “won’t,” use tidak akan.

Why is it tidak and not bukan?

Use tidak before verbs and adjectives, and bukan before nouns/pronouns (and for correcting identity). Here gagal is a verb, so tidak is correct.

• Dia bukan guru. (He/She is not a teacher.)
• Dia tidak gagal. (He/She doesn’t fail.)

What exactly does lagi mean here? Could it mean “anymore” or “currently”?

Here lagi means “again.” It can mean:

• “again”: gagal lagi (fail again)
• “anymore/no longer” when paired as tidak … lagi: Dia tidak merokok lagi (He no longer smokes)
• “currently” in colloquial progressive: lagi makan (is eating) In our sentence, tidak negates mau, not gagal, so it’s “(does) not want [to fail again],” not “no longer wants.”

Can I move lagi elsewhere, like Dia tidak mau lagi gagal besok or Dia tidak mau gagal besok lagi?