Learn Hardcore Spanish (Spain): Me costó entender la metáfora al principio, pero la estrofa final y la rima del poema me ayudaron mucho. - It was hard for me to understand the metaphor at first, but the final stanza and the rhyme of the poem helped me a lot.

Word

Me costó entender la metáfora al principio, pero la estrofa final y la rima del poema me ayudaron mucho.

Meaning

It was hard for me to understand the metaphor at first, but the final stanza and the rhyme of the poem helped me a lot.

Part of speech

sentence

Pronunciation

Course

Lesson

Breakdown of Me costó entender la metáfora al principio, pero la estrofa final y la rima del poema me ayudaron mucho.

Why does the sentence start with me costó instead of something more literal like yo tuve dificultad?

In Spanish, costar + infinitive is a very common way to say that something was difficult for someone.

Here, me is an indirect object pronoun meaning to me / for me.

Some similar examples:

So me costó entender la metáfora is a very natural Spanish structure.

Why is it entender and not a conjugated verb like entendí?

Because after costó, Spanish normally uses an infinitive to express the action that was difficult.

This works like English It was hard for me to understand..., where to understand is also not fully conjugated.

More examples:

Why is costó in the preterite? Why not costaba?