Breakdown of В детстве я хотел быть писателем и писал длинный роман про друзей.
Questions & Answers about В детстве я хотел быть писателем и писал длинный роман про друзей.
In Russian, after the verb быть (to be) with a profession, you normally use the instrumental case, not the nominative.
- Nominative: писатель – a writer (dictionary form)
- Instrumental: писателем – as a writer / being a writer
So:
- Я хотел быть писателем. – I wanted to be a writer.
This is the same pattern as:
- Я работаю врачом. – I work as a doctor.
- Она станет учителем. – She will become a teacher.
Using nominative (быть писатель) would be wrong here.
В детстве literally means in (my) childhood. It’s a very common, compact way to say when I was a child.
- В детстве я хотел быть писателем. – When I was a child, I wanted to be a writer.
- Когда я был ребёнком, я хотел быть писателем. – When I was a child, I wanted to be a writer.
They’re very close in meaning. В детстве is a set phrase and feels natural and neutral. Когда я был ребёнком is also correct but a bit longer and slightly more explicit.
Both are possible, but there is a nuance:
Хотел быть писателем – wanted to be a writer (in general).
- Focus on the state/role: “I imagined myself as a writer, that’s what I wanted for myself.”
Хотел стать писателем – wanted to become a writer.
- Focus on the process of becoming, the change from not-writer → writer.
In childhood memories, both can be used, but хотел стать писателем is slightly more common when talking about a career dream.
So your sentence with быть is correct; it just highlights the desired state rather than the process.
Хотел is past tense, imperfective: it describes a continuous or repeated desire in the past (during childhood).
- В детстве я хотел… = “As a child, I used to want / I wanted…”
Я хотел бы быть писателем is a polite conditional: I would like to be a writer.
- That’s about a hypothetical present/future desire, not about your childhood.
To talk about a past wish in childhood, я хотел is exactly right.
This is the aspect difference:
писал – imperfective past: focuses on the process, duration, or repeated action.
- …и писал длинный роман… implies you were in the process of writing a long novel. We don’t know or care if you finished it.
написал – perfective past: focuses on the result / completion.
- …и написал длинный роман… would mean you actually finished writing that long novel.
In your sentence, писал matches the idea “I used to write / I was writing a long novel about my friends”.
Both adjectives mean “long”, but in different senses:
длинный – physically long, or long in size/extent (pages, meters, list length, etc.).
- длинный роман = a novel that has many pages / is long in text.
долгий – long in time (takes a long time).
- долгий роман usually means a long-lasting romantic relationship or sometimes a story that lasts a long time in time.
For a long book, describing its length, длинный роман is the natural choice. Долгий роман in this context would sound strange or suggest a long relationship, not a big book.
Both про and о can mean “about”, but they differ in style and nuance:
про + accusative (про друзей)
- More colloquial / informal.
- Very common in everyday speech.
- роман про друзей – a novel about friends (neutral, spoken style).
о + prepositional (о друзьях)
- More neutral or slightly formal/literary.
- роман о друзьях – also a novel about friends, but sounds a bit more “literary” or “official”.
In daily conversation, про друзей is very natural. О друзьях is also correct; it just feels a little more bookish.
You’re right that про governs the accusative case. However, for many masculine animate nouns, the accusative plural form looks identical to the genitive plural.
- Nominative plural: друзья – friends
- Accusative plural: друзей – friends (as direct object, animate)
- Genitive plural: друзей – of friends
So про друзей is про + accusative plural, but its ending coincides with the genitive plural form. This is a common pattern with animate masculine nouns.
In Russian, you normally don’t repeat the subject pronoun when two verbs share the same subject and are joined by и (and):
- В детстве я хотел быть писателем и писал длинный роман…
Repeating я is not strictly wrong, but it often sounds unnecessary or slightly heavy in this kind of sentence. You would normally repeat я only if you want to emphasize a contrast or rhythm, for example:
- В детстве я хотел быть писателем, а я же вообще не любил читать. (Here, the repetition has a contrastive purpose.)
So in your sentence, the version without the second я is more natural.
Хотел (from хотеть) is a normal verb with a subject:
- Я хотел – I wanted (I = the person who wants).
Хотелось / хочется is impersonal and often expresses a more vague, emotional, or general desire:
- Мне хотелось писать романы. – I felt like writing novels / I wanted to write novels.
In your sentence, you’re clearly stating your conscious wish as a child:
- Я хотел быть писателем – very straightforward, “I wanted to be a writer.”
If you said:
- В детстве мне хотелось писать длинный роман про друзей.
That would emphasize a kind of inner longing, less direct, more like “I had this desire to…”.
Both forms are correct in their own contexts; я хотел is the simplest and clearest here.
As written, писал длинный роман most naturally suggests one specific novel:
- …писал длинный роман про друзей. – was writing a (one) long novel about friends.
If you wanted to emphasize that you wrote many long novels, you’d normally pluralize:
- писал длинные романы про друзей – I wrote long novels about friends (many).
So in this sentence, the default interpretation is one ongoing, specific long novel you were working on.