Breakdown of Vi gleder oss til bryllupet.
vi
we
oss
us
glede seg til
to look forward to
bryllupet
the wedding
Questions & Answers about Vi gleder oss til bryllupet.
What does gleder oss literally mean, and why is it translated as are looking forward?
Literally, gleder oss comes from the verb å glede (to make happy / to delight) plus the reflexive pronoun oss (ourselves).
So Vi gleder oss til bryllupet is literally something like We are making ourselves happy about the wedding.
In real, natural English, this idiom corresponds to We are looking forward to the wedding.
So å glede seg til noe is best learned as a fixed expression meaning to look forward to something.
Why do we need oss here? Why can’t we just say Vi gleder til bryllupet?
You must include oss because glede seg til is a reflexive verb in Norwegian.
Pattern:
- jeg gleder meg
- du gleder deg
- han / hun / den / det gleder seg
- vi gleder oss
- dere gleder dere
- de gleder seg
Without the reflexive pronoun, glede usually means to please / to make someone happy:
- Det gleder meg = It pleases me / It makes me happy.
But the idiom glede seg til (look forward to) always needs the reflexive pronoun:
- ✅ Vi gleder oss til bryllupet.
- ❌ Vi gleder til bryllupet. (ungrammatical in this meaning)
What is the grammatical role of oss in this sentence?